The Darkness of Randy Cunningham: The Beginning
by EvilRandy
Summary: After two disastrous events happened at Norrisville High, Randy stopped from being the Ninja and went to the Sorcerer's side instead. Question is: How will Howard face this new Cunningham? (I'm the one who created Sorcerer!Randy on Tumblr and I don't own Randy Cunningham: 9th Grade Ninja.)
1. The Beginning of All Things

It was the usual day at the high school of the town Norrisville, which has been constantly attacked by monsters and robots every day. However, the town was lucky since it has got its own beloved hero: the Ninja of Norrisville!

'Woo!' said the Ninja, dodging an attack from a giant Robo-Snake. The robot, which was a huge robot with wing roared wildly and continued attacking the blue-eyed person. The students around Norrisville High's compound started their usual cheering towards their favourite hero as the masked person kept on averting the blows from the robot, which was actually has been sent by one of the Ninja's villains, Hannibal McFist: Norrisville's gazillionnaire. The voices could be heard until reaching the sky.

'Why can't we just have a day where the Ninja will destroy the town instead of us?' the blond-haired yelled at his henchman, a tall, dark-skinned man who wore a purple lab coat as he peeped using his pair of binoculars over the battle from his McAirBalloon. 'I'm already fed up with all of these things!' 'But sir,' replied Willem Viceroy III, his assistant. 'you are the one who made a deal with the Sorcerer, so possibly you are the one who's in charge to help him in destroying the Ninja.'

'I know, but can Norrisville will have its worst day ever since the time when the Sorcerer himself almost done in conquering the world?' said McFist sadly, lowering down his binoculars. 'How about...getting the Ninja to be evil and dangerous? What do you think, Viceroy?' 'As I know, the Ninja is always good in heart and never try to harm Norrisville,' answered the dark-haired man.

'Perhaps we need to make him being humiliated and his career will fall immediately,' continued Viceroy evilly. 'Do you want the Sorcerer to stank him?' asked McFist. 'Ah, no! I'm already causing chaos one time ago and now you want the Ninja to be stanked? I bet he will completely destroying Norrisville just like the Sorcerer did once.' 'If you're talking about turning the Ninja's pure heart into an evil one, maybe I can help,' Viceroy offered. 'In what way?'

'This.' The scientist lifted up a strange-looking gun from the air balloon's side and handed it to his boss, who was quite surprised and amazed with it. 'Oh,' said McFist, gazing around the gun. 'What is this?' He began to inspect the whole weapon that his assistant created. 'It is called the 'EvilInator', changing someone's attitude from good to evil and vice versa. If you shoot it at the person whose heart was very pure and well-cared, the result is becoming the most dangerous enemy that we had ever met,' explained Viceroy, picking on his fingers as he talked.

'I like that,' spoke McFist, aiming the wonky weapon towards the Ninja,having an evil grin in his face. 'Let's do it now.' 'Wait!' Viceroy said suddenly, rushing towards the stocky-built man. 'We must humiliate him first.' He gave a wicked look at his boss, who saw it and smiled in a mean way. 'Also, you've got that thing wrong.' He turned the 'Evillinator' until its foresight showed the Ninja's concentrated face, still avoiding the Robo-Snake's ferocious attacks.

'Hey, slow it down, Robo-Snake!' warned the Ninja, letting out his favourite weapon, the sword from his scarf and eyed his opponent deeply. 'Come here, you robot thingy, get ready to be destroyed,' he whispered. 'Now, Ninja,' said McFist quietly from his site, aiming the weapon to be shot at his most hated villain, the Norrisville Ninja. 'prepared to be fooled by us. VICEROY!' he exclaimed.

'Yes, sir!' replied the scientist, holding a red button switch in his left hand. 'Make the Robo-Snake to disgrace the Ninja!' Immediately, the evil man pushed the button, letting out a wicked laughter along with his boss. The day where the normal one for the students of Norrisville High but not for the Ninja is about to begin.


	2. Falling from Grace

The Ninja was still fighting with his opponent, the giant metallic Robo-Snake at the school's compound with his faithful katana. Both of them didn't show any signs to surrender; they knew if being careless even a bit, it will be their last. The loyal warrior however, started to feel tired.

'Can we just take a break?' moaned the Ninja as he swung a lazy attack towards the robot. 'I know…*pant* you're tired as well. Come on man, we can't fight till forever, right?' His sword clanked as it hit the robot's slender body, but it didn't leave even a small dent. "Since when Viceroy started to use stronger metals for bots?" he thought.

Sneakily, he pulled out a light-green ball out of his black suit and shouted 'Ninja Electro Ball!' before threw it towards the snake, which apparently a bit surprised and swallowed the orb.

Electric charges started to malfunction it and it coughed out a thick cloud of purplish gases, which then blinded the masked person. Using his red scarf, he covered his-already-covered-mouth-and-nose and coughed as well.

'Where are you, Robo-Snake?' he called. 'I'm riiiight here. Come and get me.' A sound of chicken clucking made him jump but he brushed the thought aside. 'Probably just some stupid sound effects,' he mumbled.

The cloud gradually faded and the Ninja wished he didn't say his last sentence. He saw the Robo-Snake was smirking a winning grin to him. Below it, he saw chickens. LOTS of THEM.

'Chickens!' he squealed and accidentally dropped his katana. Shivering, he began to move backwards, backing away from his biggest fear ever. _H-how can they get here?_ He thought. McFist and Viceroy can't still remember about this, right?

He reached a corner of the school and startled as he heard some faint voices. Looking upwards, the students of Norrisville High had their camcorders and phones on, recording everything. 'No,' he whispered in fear. He clasped his head with both hands and cried, 'No!' Below the school, someone unexpected had his ears all on.

'Well, well, well. What do we have here?' the 800-and-something-years-old Sorcerer said to his only companion, a grey rat. The rodent squeaked as its reply. 'Let's see,' he continued. 'Fear of getting humiliated, and such a traumatic event. This is just nice!' His hands suddenly produced light green wisps of gas and he fired them out of his prison. 'LET THE CHAOS BEGIN!' he shouted.

Floating in mid-air, Hannibal McFist was watching gleefully as his nemesis was disgraced in front of him and the whole town of Norrisville (he recorded the scene with such a powerful binocular made exclusively by Viceroy for him, and he just waited for the moment to upload it to 'Shoob Tube').

'So, have you done already?' called Viceroy, checking his latest invention, the 'Evil McChine' for the last time and handed it to his boss. 'Wait a minute,' muttered the blond-haired. 'Wait…wait..OK!' He pushed a small button beside the binocular before took the gun and aimed it at the Ninja's direction. With the help of a small-sized of McPeepers, he finally found the target.

'Are you ready?' asked the sassy scientist. 'Ready on it! Destroy the bot!' the gazillionnaire called back. Viceroy pushed back the button he did earlier and they waited.

Back in Norrisville High, people were hooting and jeering at their beloved hero, who was defeated by a flock of chickens. A beeping sound entered the air and the Ninja looked up at the machine that ruined his perfect 800-year career. Its eyes were eyeing him excitedly and without any warning, it blew to bits, sending charred debris of wires and metals to the ground and the birds instantly vanished. The blue-eyed sighed in relief as he didn't expect it to be over that quick. Meanwhile, the Sorcerer's stank was about to reach him but it went back inside the pipes and returned to the wizard, who was furious yet saddened with it.

'NNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!' he moaned in such despair. 'Curse you, Ninja! Curse you!' The rat shut its ears with its paws to deafen the echoing noise.

The whole kids in the high school talked about the shameful thing they witnessed just now before rushing as they left the school's roof, wanting to be the first to send the video to the most popular girl in the school, Heidi Weinerman. The Ninja slumped weakly at the corner he was earlier when he had the sentences they threw played in his head.

'Scaredy-baby!' 'Weakling!' 'Crybaby!' 'Such a shame!'

The fallen warrior embraced himself as he remembered the scene he had went through just now.

McFist was in cloud nine and he tittered before he put his finger at Evil McChine's trigger and whispered, 'Hello, Ninja. Welcome to the party.' He then pulled it.

A bright red beam shot out from its forecast and headed straight to the Ninja, who didn't even notice it since he was in deep sadness. The beam hit him with a faint blow and he massaged his head and his eyes alarmingly went around before he saw a crumpled paper was beside him. He took it and unfolded it, only to see a 'Scaredy Ninja!' was written in capital letters on it. Chucking the paper away, he drew out a small black-and-red ball and threw it to the ground sluggishly.

'Smoke…bomb.'


	3. The Worse One

Inside Norrisville High School, a young teen was running across its vast lobby with eyes wildly looked around, as if to search something important. Sweats were pouring from his forehead and an anxious look was in his face as he bolted past the students (who yelled 'Watch it, kid!) and often skidded on the floor on his way entering each of the school's corridors.

When he reached the end of the hallway where his locker was, he opened his mouth and the word 'How-' escaped his mouth before he was smacked into an opened locker's door right in his face and landed on the blue tiles with a loud thud.

'Owww,' he moaned and rubbed the bridge of his nose gently. A voice entered the air, saying, 'Cunningham?' A slam was heard as the person shut the locker and continued, 'Yo, Randy! Answer me if you're still awake!'

Randy opened his eyes and saw his best mate, the chubby, cheesy Howard Weinerman was at his side, squatting. 'You OK?' the orange-haired asked with his eyebrows knitted. 'I don't think so,' he replied with a sigh and winced when Howard poked his nose. 'Ow!'

'Sorry!' said Howard with his oh-so-familiar giggle. 'I thought it wasn't serious. Wanna go to the nurse's room?' 'Guess I have to,' the raven-haired grumbled. 'I'll take your bag,' Howard offered and Randy slowly got up, watching as Howard worked on his combination numbers, took the blue satchel and closed it and swung open his locker, grabbed his green backpack and kicked it shut, gave the satchel to him and started walking together.

'So, uh, how's the fight?' asked the brown-eyed and Randy's heart sank immediately. 'Y-you never ask about those Ninja times, you said yourself it's lame!' he replied hesitantly. 'I KNOW IT'S LAME! I'M JUST ASKING!'

They entered the hallway and Howard glanced at his McFist Watch and boomed, 'Oooh, it's lunchtime! Can't wait to have gravy fries!' The lanky boy only smiled weakly and the sound of the television placed in each corridor inside Norrisville High got switched on echoed along the hallway and a girl with orange hair's face was on the screen.

'Students of Norrisville, 'tis I, Heidi Weinerman, reporting exclusively for the #MeCast!' she announced and ('Lame-o!' said Howard) as fast as lightning, the other students started gathering around the scene, blocking Howard's view.

'Lift me up, Cunningham!' Tugging Randy's grey hoodie, he pleaded and Randy lowered his body and he climbed onto him and sat on his shoulder, cheering, not noticing a horrified look was in his bro's face.

'Today, we just got a honkin' shocking news, The Ninja was chicken'd out?! *some people gasping sound effects boomed* I don't know myself, but here's a video a student has recorded, let's CHECK IT OUT!' said Heidi and the video of the red-and-black warrior of the town surrounded by the white chickens was on the screen and everyone was howling with laughter at once.

'Are you KIDDING ME?!' said Howard, slapping Randy's back repeatedly. 'Put me down!' Obediently, the blue-eyed bent forwards and the chubby kid slid down and hollered until his sister's show was over and finally heaved a deep breath, mumbling, 'Please tell me this is just a joke she came up with.' He looked at Randy and saw he was as pale a ghost.

'No cheese man!' shouted Howard as the truth dawned on him. 'I know! I want to tell you about it but I can't but the video's already showed you everything, I can't deny it!' cried Randy. 'I was the first! Me! The-' His next words were blocked by Howard's small palms and stared around warily for a while before the kid in blue hissed, 'You better watch your mouth, Cunningham.'

'I can't believe it! It's been 800 years and…I was the first Ninja to get humiliated, in front of everyone.' Randy leaned his head against Howard's broad chest sorrowfully.

'Oh come on now, everybody's got their bad moments, including the Ninja,' said Howard, trying to comfort his biffer. 'But it's awful.' 'Tell you what, let's have gravy fries and I'll fix your nose. And 'bout that chicken thing *chuckled* don't worry, everybody's gonna forget it.'

Randy looked up to his childhood friend's face and managed to give out a small weak smile. 'That's my MAN!' said the brown-eyed, starting to head towards the cafeteria. 'Come on, before they're sold out!'

The purple-haired shuffled behind Howard, who was giddy to have his favorite meal in the school's cafeteria, the gravy fries. "Oh gravy fries, just wait 'til I got my hands on you!" he thought. As his eyes fell on the left corridor, he stopped. 'H'oh boy,' he whispered and left at once.

Randy covered his face with his hands; his nose began to stab him with such pain. Suddenly he bumped into something hard and looked up, seeing Hannibal McFist's stepson, Bashford "Bash" Johnson and his small gang of bullies, all were smirking at him. 'Wonk,' the only word that was formed in his head.


	4. MEGA-Humiliation

'Hey there!' Bash greeted, his friends guffawed behind him. 'Uh, hi Bash,' said Randy, not lowering his hands. The school bully was a bit puzzled since his voice was muffled. 'What're you hiding in your hands?' he asked.

'It's nothing,' the freshman replied nervously, starting to step away from him. 'I-I'm sorry if I blocked your way, I will go, don't worry, it's just-' 'Hold him,' ordered the brown-haired. 'What?'

'Get him!' said Bash and Mick went to hold guard on Randy, who didn't manage to make his escape. 'Let me go!' he wriggled when the bloke gripped his arms. 'Show me!' 'No way, Bash!'

'You said so, but I will do it anyway!' the stocky teenager tittered and reached for him. The grey-hooded kid shut his eyes in horror and he could feel his hands were lowered and...

'Eh, there's nothing to be seen,' he heard Bash's gruff voice. He opened his eyes and saw the gang gave him a dissatisfied look. Silently, he sighed in relief.

Randy only watched as they walked away from him with everyone gave him a bump at the shoulder which hurted him (the hardest was Mick's), but he didn't mind. Glad for not being into trouble, he began to head towards the school's cafeteria.

'I haven't do a wedgie since I last did it to a monkey bot at McFist's office!' babbled Bash to his friends, who only chimed in agreement. 'Two months ago! Can you guys believe that?' 'You know what, Bash,' said the red-hooded of his friends, 'you can just give him a wedgie just now.' He jerked his thumb towards Randy's direction.

'Yeah!' exclaimed the boy, slapping hard at his back. 'Good thinking!' He went back for the kid with the blue satchel. Shrugging, Bash's bros then followed him.

Meanwhile, Randy was thinking about the incident. "Howard was in front of me before Bash; why didn't he warn me about him?" Knitting his eyebrows, he scrunched his face. "Or...maybe he want those gravy fries all by himself? Including mine?"

The truth dawned on him so shockingly that he didn't hear the heavy footfalls of Bash Johnson behind him. He was startled when his huge hand rested on his shoulder and seeing the grinning visage of him.

'Hey there!' he greeted again. 'What's up this time, Bash?' Randy answered sheepishly, holding his satchel's shoulder strip. 'I hope you won't mind about this,' said Norrisville's gazillionnaire's stepson. 'About...what?'

'This!' Without warning, Bash reached for his underpants and pulled it, causing him to jerk upwards as he lifted him easily with his biffers watched it gleefully.

Randy's face was red but not as much as when Norrisville High School's bell rang around the school and his eyes went wide. Hearing it, he pleaded, 'Bash! Put me down!'

'Not yet, boy! I haven't finished yet!' said the grey-shirted. 'Please!'

A creak entered the hallway and they looked ahead ("This is not GOOD," thought Randy), only to see it began to fill up with students who had had lunch walking out of the cafeteria and started chatting while heading back to their class for the afternoon session and...

...they saw the wedgie.

They stared at Bash, then at Randy for a while before slowly, titters filled the air and finally, a great laughter echoed all over the corridor. Girls covered their faces with their bags, blushing furiously.

Randy's eyes had a horrified look as he faced the most terrifying time in his life: humiliated **twice** right in front of everyone in Norrisville High.

(line break)

Howard licked his fingers with full satisfaction, happy to have his box of gravy fries. Wiping his mouth with a handkerchief, he glanced aside and saw another box that was still untouched; he had took one for Randy.

He let out a burp (Mrs. Dempsey the lunch lady shook her head as she saw it) and went to wash his hands before taking his green backpack and Randy's box of lunch. Slightly kicking the cafeteria door, he then walked out of the room.

The moment he stepped out, a sea of students were blocking his way and hootings and jeerings of laughter entered the air. Groaning, he sprawled on the blue-tiled floor and began his journey to get out from the packed hallway, shielding his bro's food with one hand. Seeing a gap between a blond boy with a satchel and a kid wearing glasses and dressed in blue, he quickly went towards it and when he stood up, his jaw dropped before he joined the crowd.

Randy was still pleading to Bash to put him back on the ground but apparently it didn't work. He spotted something with ruffled orange hair and he immediately knew it was Howard. 'Howard!' he called. He wriggled harder while holding the bully's hands in attempt to release himself.

Something was torn. That was what the others heard and the corridor went silent as a ghost town. Their eyes fell onto the purple-haired kid and they knew it: his underpants made the sound. Without such mercy, the boys howled louder than ever and Randy shouted in tears:

'NNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOO!'


	5. The Call

At downtown Norrisville, a giant McAirBalloon was heading towards the tallest building in the town, McFist Industries. Two men were inside it; one was concentrating on his McFist Pad while the other one was humming a cheerful song.

'Don't you think this is our best day ever, Viceroy?' said Hannibal McFist, the town's gazillionnaire to his henchman Willem Viceroy III. 'Mmmm hmmm,' replied the scientist, frowning.

'Oh, come on mow, Viceroy! We should celebrate this!' The blond-haired wrapped his robotic right arm over Viceroy, who lowered his gadget. 'Forget about the Ninja; we've already got him!'

'Not really,' said the spectacled one. 'Evil McChine is not giving any response yet.' They both glanced at a black-and-red machine gun-look-like weapon which they placed at one of the corners inside the air balloon. 'What do you mean..."not giving any response yet"?' asked McFist, lowering his arm.

'It works when the Ninja is having an emotional time,' explained the purple-coated. 'Like, being sad?' 'It can be anything. Anything that makes him feeling negative. Anger, sadness, disgraced...' Both of them smiled, remembering the scene when the beloved hero of Norrisville was humiliated right in front of its citizens.

'What's inside the Robo-Snake just now?' McFist looked downwards, searching for the McTruck that brought the pieces and shards of the metallic snake that attacked the town's high school before. 'A scanner, enabling it to see what is he afraid of and something that can make his nightmare come to life,' Viceroy replied. 'You mean like that rhino bot?' 'Yep.'

'Good thing it was destroyed,' said the stocky man with a grin. 'Sure, you too are glad with it, right?' The scientist only rolled his eyes as his answer and went back to check his McFist Pad about Evil McChine.

(line break)

Ignoring the terrible howls of amusements made by his schoolmates, Randy's mind was full of thoughts. "Humiliated? Me? But...I'm the Ninja. I can't be humiliated!" His eyes were pooled with such tears. "Oh, wait. I've already been humiliated. WHAT?!" He remembered the fight he had with the Robo-Snake earlier.

"This...this can't be! I, Randy Cunningham, was disgraced in front of Norrisville TWICE?!" Without thinking much more, he pulled himself out of Bash's wedgie and bolted into the crowd. The students there let him passed by them but the boy's steps were accompanied by their jeers and hoots. Someone's whistle entered the air and they went louder.

Randy kept running until he found a nearby bathroom and was glad with its sight when suddenly, a awful pain was shot in his nose.

'Wh-what the juice?' He slowed down and cupped his hands over his face and lowered them. Red liquid was smeared onto his skin. Blood.

Quickly, he dashed towards the bathroom and swung it open before entering it, leaving a trail of his blood-covered hand at the door knob. A click was heard; he locked the bathroom from anyone.

Irving Slimovitz, the principal of Norrisville High School walked out of his office when he heard a noise outside his room. Feeling curious, he went to the corridor with his hands at his hips and was terrified when he saw the handprint.

'Please don't hurt me, the Cursed Bleeding Hand. I'll leave you alone, and I hope you will do the same to me,' he whispered in fright, clasping his hands together and left.

Inside the bathroom, pure water that gushed out from one of its taps turned crimson red instantly the moment Randy washed his face and hands. He had put his satchel at another sink to avoid it being wet. After a while, he closed the tap and reached for an orange-colored fluffy towel that was hung at the hooks and dried himself with it. He put it down, only to see it was stained with his blood in seconds.

His sapphire blue eyes bore at it, its color reminded him of someone. Howard. For once, he wondered why he was inside the bathroom in the first place. Then it came; he with Howard were heading to the cafeteria but the brown-eyed was nowhere when he dealt with McFist's stepson. The unexpected wedgie that the bully done had made him all eyes' attention. Disgraced.

The towel shook heavily in his grip; he was angry with the whole incident. He could feel the rush of adrenaline inside his body, wanting to seek revenge. To do harm to anyone who had innocently made fun of him.

Without any warning, a great force suddenly striked into Randy's head like a giant gong that was beaten right inside his ear and he cried out in pain, holding his head with eyes closed. The orange towel fell onto the red-tiled floor near his feet. His brain throbbed for a while and when the pain was gone, he opened his eyes, feeling dizzy.

'Wh-what happened just now?' he mumbled. Everything around him was bleary and surreal. Slowly, he made his steps forwards and took his blue bag. Something red was on his shadowy image at the mirror and he knew his nose was bleeding again.

'Wonk,' he muttered. Probably it was caused by his accidental bump onto Bash. He unzipped his satchel and pulled out a red face mask. "Good thing I've brought this," he said to himself and put it on. At least no one knew about it. Except Howard.

His head was still pounding when he went towards the bathroom's door with his hood on. Slinging his bag onto his shoulder, he swung it open and saw the very one he wanted to meet personally. His best bro.


	6. Death of a Friendship

'Hey,' greeted Howard nervously, fiddling his fingers when he saw Randy. Apparently he'd waited for him after Principal Slimovitz told everyone in the corridor to leave for their classes. The old man didn't know about the wedgie, though.

'What did you want?' said Randy coldly, but his voice was barely audible thanks to his mask. 'What?' asked Howard innocently. 'I said, "What did you want?"' the tall boy repeated a bit louder.

'I'm sorry,' the chubby kid said with a chuckle. 'Can't hear much.' He dug his green backpack and pulled out a cotton bud before cleaning inside of his ear with it. Randy only watched it with disgust beneath his hood. 'Where's everyone?' he asked when he didn't hear any sound inside the school.

'Eh, school's over already,' Howard replied. 'Wasting my time here waiting for your butt to show up when I should've already been in Sleep Zone right now.

'Anyway...' he continued, throwing away the cotton bud into a nearby dustbin and rubbed his hands together. '...I'm truly sorry for the whole thing.' 'About what?' the raven-haired asked, puzzled. 'I've just ate your gravy fries.'

'WHAT?!' Randy's eyes went wide. 'Yeah, I know, you'll be mad,' Howard admitted. 'But I'm just SO hungry that I can't resist it when I saw yours! Please tell me you'll forgive me. Please!' He did an innocent puppy face in attempt to get his friend's forgiveness.

Randy mentally facepalmed and sighed behind his face mask. "Why? Why, Howard? Did you know that I've been longing for them, and you just ate it like..." he thought miserably. He then gazed at his biffer, who was still putting on his puppy face; something was bothering him. He snapped out of his deep thoughts and was shocked: Howard started it all. The humiliation he had by the wedgie, was caused by him.

The burning feeling of rage inside him began to rise again and his heart ached in pains of sorrow. "You caused all of this, Howard," he muttered.

Suddenly, he pounced towards Howard, who was startled with his sudden action and pinned him on the floor, a fierce look was on his face.

'Cunningham, what the juice?' asked Howard, shivering a bit.

'You,' said Randy balefully behind his mask, 'You started it all!' 'Started what?! I didn't do anything!'

'Yes you did! You think I didn't know what you've done?' 'I don't know what you're saying and I don't want to know about it!' shouted Howard, but the hooded one ignored him. 'You've caused me to be disgraced in Norrisville's face!'

Howard widened his eyes, staring at Randy with full of shock. His biffer got his cheese wonked twice in a day?!

'Listen up Cunningham, I can explain...' he started when the blue-eyed suddenly cut in, 'Why didn't you tell me?' 'Tell you what?'

'About Bash!' Randy shouted, surprising him. 'You saw him, Howard! You can just warn me about him! Before he came and did the wedgie on me!' 'How can I do that?' Howard defended himself by raising his voice a bit. 'It was your fault that you walked SO slowly back then!'

'My fault? Hey, if you didn't leave your honkin' locker opened like that, this thing won't ever happen! I won't be wearing this mask right now!' Randy cued with his eyes at the red mask he put on to Howard. 'So you're saying this is MY FAULT?!' 'YES!'

'You...' Before long, they began wrestling on the blue-tiled floor with Howard tried to free himself from Randy's grasps, which was rather impossible since he was locked too well by his bro's legs. Randy however, aiming his fists towards the ginger, his eyes somehow shone in hatred beneath his grey hood.

After a while, with a strong kick at the abdomen, Howard managed to get away from Randy and hurriedly standing up, panting. 'What is up with you, Cunningham?' he asked between his breaths, a hint of concern was in his voice. His face was bruised, thanks to the shoob who was his friend.

Randy was on the floor, holding his stomach for a few moments, feeling completely awful both at his belly and his head. "What is wrong with me?" he thought. He could feel the sharp pain inside his skull which was honkingly terrible, like he was being repeatedly stabbed there. "Why am I punching Howard just now?" He opened his watery eyes and looked at Howard. 'Howard...?' he called.

'Enough of all these things!' the stout boy spoke, which made him cower a bit. 'Yes! I did it, Cunningham! I didn't tell you 'bout that wonkin' Bash was coming and that happened! Satisfied?' He stared right in his biffer's eyes.

The raven-haired's heart sank immediately after he heard it. He should have known it, right? No need to ask about it anymore. But why did he?

'From now on, we're nothing. You and me, we're no longer biffers. Not on your life and not on my life either.' Howard continued. With that, he started walking to leave Randy, who quickly scurried at him and grabbed his left leg, almost sending him onto the floor. 'What did you want?' he asked angrily, facing the kid.

'Howard, I didn't mean to – ' 'You know what? Get lost.'

Randy unconsciously released his grip from Howard's leg, mortified with his childhood friend's words.

'Oh, and one more thing, shoob,' the Weinerman boy turned around for the last time. The boy with the blue satchel had his ears perked on. 'Everyone's given you a new name: the Wedgie Kid. Hope you like it.' He then continued his pace along the hallway before turning right and completely disappeared from Randy's view. A long creak echoed inside the school; the main doors of Norrisville High were opened and went shut by a loud thud.

Randy only sat there on the cold blue-tiled floor, refusing to believe his world had turned upside-down in just one day. He had lost his pride, his Ninja and Randy reputations, and now he had lost his only friend. And it won't be impossible that he will lose his family as well.

(line break)

Inside the pyramid-shaped McFist Industries, the mad scientist Willem Viceroy III was listening to his McRadio and drinking a giant glass of strawberry slushies (McFist bought it to celebrate the "unguaranteed success" of the Evil McChine) in his room while working on some complex calculations when his McFist Pad on his desk suddenly lit. Seeing it, he switched off the device, resting his legs onto the desk and took the Pad, unlocking the security code he had placed (in case of being stolen) and scrolled down the screen before tapping on the app titled "Mega Projects".

He shook his head right when the app's contents appeared. So far, no response was shown. Not even a tiny progress made by the deadly gun. He threw it onto his fluffy bed and continued his work, unaware the Evil McChine that was placed at the corner of his room was glowing in a dull red colour.


	7. Breaking the Barrier

A loud grumble of thunder woke Randy up from his deep trance. His eyes wildly looked around, only to see the insides of Norrisville High School was quite dark. Curious, he got up and slowly made his way towards the school's main doors, lowering his grey hood and chucked away the red mask he wore just now to conceal his still-bleeding nose, which he did not need it anymore.

Entering the vast lobby of the building, he then headed towards the doors and swung open one of them. A downpour and a howl of wind that blew strongly outside the school quickly drenched him wet with water from the gloomy clouds that were all over Norrisville, forcing him to immediately shut his eyes. He wiped his face until he figured all the stains on his visage were gone and fumbled for the door handle of the grand door he'd opened just now before he looked up into the grey sky, wondering.

'Why did everytime when something bad happened, it have to be raining?' he muttered with a weak smile. Slowly, he stepped back and closed the door, now was surrounded by the bleakness inside the lobby. A light source had brightened the large room a bit though, so he wasn't completely going to crash into something he didn't want to.

Randy knew, he couldn't go home now, especially when there's a rainstorm out there. His mom might babbling on him why he was wet if he ran the whole way to home, telling him he could catch a wonkin' cold. That's definitely not gonna happen. Besides, the wedgie might have been broadcasted to the whole town, in which he cannot bear the double humiliations he had went through.

His sapphire blue eyes fell onto the small yellow stone that was half-stuck outside and the other half was buried in the ground right at the middle of the lobby. He knew it was the Eye of Eternity, the magical stone that kept the spirit of the bird demon, the Tengu. The first Norrisville Ninja had locked it to obtain its feathers to weave the Ninja Mask he had now, tucked safely in his blue satchel. The oldest of the chosen Ninjas to protect Norrisville back on 800 years ago had used it to seal his arch-enemy, the Sorcerer using a key called the Sorcerer's Key. Now it was called the Carp's Eye, taken from the mosaic carp that covered at least a few metres of the red floor of the lobby.

The demon could possess anyone if it was set free by breaking the Stone, and only the Ninja could do that.

As he continued staring at the light-emitting Stone, he suddenly formed a thought. Howard had told him school had already over before he left. That meant he was all alone in the school. Except he acknowledged Norrisville High's janitor, Sundown was also inside, cleaning the whole building till his body ached, which he would not until at least 6 o' clock in the evening.

He cautiously looked around before he decided to do what he had firmly planned. After a while, he let out a deep breath, confirming there were no interruptions going to happen. His hands trembled slightly and he hold the shoulder strip of his satchel.

Randy walked towards the Eye of Eternity with his blue eyes bore deeply at the brightly-lit stone. His right hand reached out for his satchel and began searching something in the bag. After a while, he pulled it out, revealing a black-and-red Ninja sai he'd kept in his satchel for defense (just in case) and gripped it hard.

He then knelt in front of it, staring at the Stone with full of anger and hatred. The yellow light from it illuminated his face which returned being stained with trails of blood from his broken nose.

In the blink of his eyes, the faces of Norrisville High's students teetering and making fools out of him swam inside his head. Adrenaline rushed all over his body and the sai he took out of his Ninja suit shook heavily in his hand. He was determined to do it. He wanted to be free, away from anything, like a bird.

Randy held the weapon high, his focus was still on the Eye with their visages kept flashing. He closed his eyes, already picturing what will happen. He will lose control of the demon and even his life. With a shout, he pierced the sai's sharp tip deep into the floor and waited to hear a bird's shrill cry.

A few seconds passed but nothing happened, which wondered him. Re-opened his eyes, he faced down and was shocked.

He missed the target. By a few centimetres.

The Eye of Eternity was shining brightly as if to tease him for failing in breaking it. Enraged, he pulled it out and threw it to the other side of the room, panting. His clenched fists were white on his knees.

'That's it,' he said as the weapon hit one of the lockers that lined along each side of the vast lobby with a loud thud and landed on the floor with a clank. 'Being Randy Cunningham, you failed. Being the Ninja, double failed. Why can't I focus? I just have to jam the sai, that's all.' A faint buzzing sound suddenly went out from his bag and he, being fully depressed yelled in despair, 'Shut up, Nomicon!' The noise went silent as fast as it first came.

The teen ran his fingers over his tyrian purple hair, his gaze returned to the Stone, sobbing. Its yellow light continued to lit his face and he started blaming himself on what happened. That he was stupid to be disgraced twice a row in only a day. Not able to see Howard Weinerman was betraying him from behind. Did not do anything to stop the boy from leaving him. You are a honkin' wonkin' idiot, Randy, he thought.

He had lost hope to continue living. He wanted to die. For him, death is waaaay better than bearing a humiliation for life. Tears began to fall out of his eyes and hit his knuckles, his body was shaking very badly.

'I'm a failure!' he shouted out loud, his voice echoed inside Norrisville High. The sound entered one of the school's sewer pipes and eventually reached the place underneath the Eye of Eternity:

The Sorcerer's prison.

The wizard had heard everything from the moment Heidi showed the video of the Ninja to the whole town. 'Looks like we are going to have some fun, aren't we?' he asked the only companion he had in his prison, the grey rat. It nodded as if agreeing with him.

'Humiliation, desperation, loneliness – ' he ticked his four bony fingers as he talked '- facing a betrayal, broken heart, want to commit suicide, such a feast!' The rodent squeaked excitedly in return.

The Sorcerer stood up from his ancient stool and his hands suddenly produced clouds of black gas and he fired them towards the Eye, knowing his victim was there.

'This will be the day when you cannot stop me, Ninja!' He and his rat laughed evilly as the mysterious black stank headed to the outside world.


	8. The Start: Part 1

Randy was still at the Carp's Eye, mourning over all his misery. The stone reflected his face on its shiny golden surface, showing a 14-year old kid with puffy eyes and trails of tears on his cheeks. A few drops of blood from his bleeding nose dripped onto the mosaic carp, which he completely ignored it.

He was numb with stillness, spending lots of time cursing and putting him on the blame and crying. Brushing away the pools of salty water around his eyes, he choked out a small sob before getting up and was about to take back his Ninja sai he'd thrown away when a faint whoosh entered the air, startling him.

'Hello?' he ventured, looking around alarmingly. 'Is there anyone there?' He held the strip of his bag, feeling rather afraid. He'd love to go Ninja-ing, but thinking it was such a waste, he decided to deal with the situation as Randy Cunningham. Besides, what if it was just a rat or howls of winds that blew inside the school? He didn't see any need of being the Ninja there.

After a while, thinking it was just the strong wind outside Norrisville High, he went warily towards the row of lockers where the weapon was and again, the sound came.

'It's just the wind, Randy,' he told himself. 'Nothing to be scared of.' He reached the other side of the school's lobby and retrieved the sai, holding it tightly.

"Randy Cunningham," a voice slowly whispered at his ears, making him to turn at the room's drain hole and something glowing attracted his attention. It took him a few seconds to realize his arch-enemy, the Sorcerer had heard his woes and without needing the Ninja-Nomicon's urgent red light inside his satchel, he ran for his life.

He tried to open the door that led to one of the school's corridors, which was beside the lockers he'd been right now. However, it seemed to be stuck for some unknown reasons.

'What the juice?' he said, jingling the doorknob several times, but it wouldn't budge. 'Come on man, this isn't the best time for jokes!' He kicked the door as much as he could, hoping it to fall off its hinges so that he could escape from the room. From the somewhat mysterious stank. Too bad it didn't.

Feeling furious, he began stabbing the wooden door using his sai to form holes onto it but each time he managed to bore one, it was magically repaired.

Terrified, he looked behind him and saw clouds of black gas escaped from the drain hole, heading towards him. With his eyes widened in horror, he could only think he was going to be stanked by the vile wizard.

Instead, they combined to produce something huge and he gawped as they rose high into the air, forming a giant black dome that went as high as Norrisville High's ceiling, slowly swallowing anything that was in its way, from the lockers to the stairs which led to the building's second and third floor.

Randy only watched as the dome grew larger and quietly approached him. Suddenly, the whole lobby became dark: it had prevented any light to break into, not even the Tengu's Stone's.

Finally, it loomed over him and he was trapped inside, away from the outside world. Randy quickly slid down, thinking it was the best thing he could do for that time. He rummaged his pocket to search his phone to switch on the flashlight but even the device itself didn't light up. Great, he thought with rolling eyes and kept it back, feeling annoyed. Apparently the black stank has the ability to shut anything related to light.

The only source of light he had was from the Nomicon, which was still glowing furiously in his satchel. He quickly hugged it, glad to have company, even only with a book.

Without warning, something took hold of the bag and he, taken aback by the sudden action almost lost it but kept his grip firmly. The unseen force continued to tug the ancient book away from him and after a long while battling, it won, sending Randy lurched backwards a bit, dragging his blue satchel away along with the Nomicon's red light illuminating the dome's inside before eventually swallowed by the darkness.

The kid was too shocked yet puzzled with the whole incident. Frantically, he started to crawl forwards blindly, attempting to retrieve his bag and get out of the creepy dome as fast as he could. His sai clanked on the unseen floor of the great dome every time he moved.

'Nomicon!' he called. 'Nomicon, where are you?' His hands ran over something and he expected it being the book. Instead, the hemisphere surface of it made him to change his mind: it was the light-blocked Eye of Eternity. 'Nomicon!' he cried out loud, the whole negative feelings returned inside him.

A small giggle caught his attention and Randy lifted his head up, seeing literally everyone in Norrisville had surrounded him, their cruel faces and horrible laughters made him to feel small and powerless.

'Nice wedgie you got there, RC,' he heard the gruff voice of the jock Buttermaker which was accompanied with a titter. 'How does it feel to be afraid of chickens?' someone spoke. 'Hah, chickens!' Flocks of chickens suddenly appeared of nowhere and headed towards the horrified boy, who quickly pulled his grey hood over his head and face, traumatized with the battle he had with the Robo-Snake earlier.

Randy screamed out in awful pain as the birds began pecking his body with their strangely sharper-than-ever beaks, tearing away the fabrics of his hoodie and shirt. 'Get...OFF ME!' he shrieked, batting them away using the sai but with no luck.

'Weakling!' 'Scaredy-baby!' 'Dumb!' The town's residents' dreadful jeers and hoots of amusements only made the whole situation even worse.

'He's a wonkin' kid!' a voice boomed around the black dome and the noise died immediately. Even the chickens stopped. Covered in trickles of his blood, Randy raised his head a bit and saw Howard Weinerman was standing in front of him, having a sour look in his usual jovial face.

'H-Howard,' he mumbled, twitching; the injuries caused by the birds were too much for him to bear. The orange-haired boy only stared at him as if he was something wonk to be seen, thanks to bits of torn-up skin that were all over his arms and legs. Then, he continued: 'A weak Ninja!'

Surprised to hear the sentence, Randy called weakly, 'Howard, no – '

'We don't need someone like him!' Howard added. 'What should we call him, guys?'

'Shoob!' the crowd replied and they started chanting the word in unison along with their other cat-calls, which rang inside the evil dome.

'Shoob! Shoob! Shoob!' they repeated gleefully, their eyes shone in full of wickedness. (What kind of people who being so CRUEL to one else, really?)

'Please, stop!' Randy shouted with hard effort tearfully, clasping his injured hands over his ears to drown the racket they did. In the Sorcerer's prison, the old wizard was enjoying himself and joined the 'Shoob' chant as well.

'That's right, keep it going, my dear,' he referred to his black stank. He beamed at the grey rat, which was rather surprised with it started squeaking noisily at him as if asking a question. 'Did you hear the misery of this boy up there?' the Sorcerer asked back, in which the rodent nodded.

'With it, my powers will be MORE than ENOUGH for me to escape this DREADED prison- ' he pointed to his belt of green Chaos Pearls that glowed brighter than ever, some of them were floating high above him '- and soon, I CAN FINALLY RULE THE WORLD!'

He laughed ecstatically before producing more of the black stank and blasted it towards the unseen Eye of Eternity. 'Turn him into a beast of darkness!' he ordered and went on entertaining himself with the woeful cries from the boy whom he didn't even know he was his most hated enemy, the Ninja.


	9. The Start: Part 2

Willem Viceroy III had just finished his calculations on how long his newest invention, the menacing Evil McChine will start functioning on the Norrisville Ninja and was about to gulp down the last drops of his strawberry slushies when a bright red light suddenly brightened his room from behind. Feeling something was wrong, he turned his comfy chair around and was astounded; the weapon was glowing.

'Hannibal!' He accidentally knocked the drink all over his purple lab coat, but he ignored it. He grabbed the McChine and his McFist Pad and raced for the triangular elevator that led to his boss's office.

Two Robo-Apes were walking out from the nearest lift, chatting when Viceroy ran into them, sending them onto the green-tiled floor and entered the now empty elevator. 'What's up with Mr. Viceroy, Eric?' one asked as the lift's doors slid shut without a sound. The robot named Eric only shrugged before getting up and both of them then left the scene.

Viceroy tapped his feet impatiently in the elevator, sometimes glancing at the classic brown wristwatch his mom had gave him. He switched on his McFist Pad and went to the "Mega Projects" app. His black eyes widened in panic behind his glassy rectangle spectacles. The machine somewhat moved VERY slowly; he could have kicked it off in anger.

Finally, the lift stopped at its destination and its silver doors slid open. He quickly marched towards his boss, the beloved philanthropist of Norrisville, Hannibal McFist, who was listening to one of his McFist Tones using his McRadio at his office desk.

'Viceroy!' greeted McFist happily when he saw the scientist. 'Hey, what's up with your clothes?' He pointed towards his pal's wet coat. Viceroy looked at himself and said, 'Oh, this. Just my slushies back there.' He jerked his thumb behind him, showing McFist the direction of his room.

'So, how's it going with the "Evil" McChine, by the way?' the man with the robotic arm asked, chuckling for a while, which annoyed Viceroy. 'Sir, we're about to have a problem,' he reported, folding his arms.

'Oooh, really?' said the blond. 'What's that?' He rested his arms on his desk. The tall man placed the Evil McChine onto it; its light had shined their faces. Both of them stared at it for a long while before McFist broke the silence,' What's wrong with it?'

'For some reasons, I think this indicates that the ray you shot to the Ninja had started working!' Viceroy exclaimed happily. 'YAY!' the stocky-built man applauded. 'But still, there is a problem.'

'You're ruining my mood, Viceroy, not good of you,' said McFist. The scientist pulled a face and started, 'Its light was too bright and fast-coming; I think the Ninja is terrified out of his cheese. What I meant is Evil McChine has the tendency to convert one's fears into something evil. ' He showed his McFist Pad to his boss, who frowned as he saw the current progress of the McChine, which was at 40%.

Suddenly the weapon glowed even brighter and the percentage increased, making it to be 50%, surprising them.

'What does this mean?' asked the gazillionnaire, yawning and handed the Pad to its owner.

'It means, the more the Ninja is frightened, the shorter the time it takes for him to become a bad Ninja. And when I say "bad", I really meant it.' Viceroy took his device, a flash of worry appeared in his face.

'So you're saying the Ninja is facing something that scares him out of his wits right now?' said McFist, eyeing his henchman. The black-haired only nodded.

'Sweet cheese, what could it be? Chicken?' the blond continued, stroking his chin. 'It could be,' replied the scientist with a shrug before he sat on McFist's office desk. 'We could only wait...and watch.'

(line break)

Inside Norrisville High School, it seemed normal. Nothing bizarre happened, unless you count Sundown took some bubblegum scraps from under students' desks and chew them like the world was his (Eeugh!) before he went home.

However, he didn't see what he _should_ actually saw when he crossed the school's lobby: a gigantic black dome which covered almost every inch of the large room. He whistled while jingling his bunch of rusty keys, gave a slow kick towards the yellow Eye of Eternity, swung open one of the grand blue-and-yellow doors merrily and stared at the rainstorm outside the school for a while before shouted:

'Oh, mama! I forgot my umbrella!' He raced back towards his room at the end of the building and grabbed a flashy pink umbrella he had placed at the corner of that room.

Finally walked out from Norrisville High with his umbrella on, Sundown put one of the giant keys into its lock and locked the school's doors. Happy with his daily job was done, he went towards the garage and climbed up a fancy-looking red jeep and started its engine.

'Oh, yeah!' he cried and revved the jeep, placing the umbrella at the back seat of the vehicle. Putting on a bucket onto his head to avoid being wet, he let out a cowboy cry before leaving the school in the downpour.

Too bad.

Randy Cunningham was still in the school, hidden from his view, thanks to the black dome. He'd banged the unseen wall to attract the janitor's attention but it was proven by him: it was sound-proof, light-proof and any other proofs you could imagine.

The black stank from the Sorcerer's prison continued to add more tortures to its trapped victim by making the Norrisvillians' catcalls and jeers rang loudly inside its dome. The boy cried miserably beneath his hood with chickens were pecking his flesh, leaving him surrounded in a pool of his blood.

'Shoob! Shoob! Shoob!' they went. 'Stop,' he mumbled, his tears slid down onto his cheeks.

He suddenly felt someone was watching him. Slowly, he raised his head and even though the huge crowd of Norrisville's residents blocked his view, he saw them. At the very end of the crowd.

His parents.

A man was comforting a woman whose face was buried in his chest, sobbing awfully. Her wavy long dark hair***** made Randy to easily recognize she was his mom.

'Mom?' he croaked. 'D-Dad...?'

They lifted their faces to look at him.

Without warning, the man shouted among the 'Shoob' chant, 'You have disgraced our family!'

'Dad, no - ' 'You have brought shame to the Cunninghams! None of our family has been humiliated this much!'

'Dad, please listen to me!' Randy called out. Using all of his effort, he tried to stand up but someone yanked him from behind and he was back onto the floor. 'Dad!'

'You are no longer part of this family! Not anymore!' the man continued; the woman's body shook heavily and he patted her head before giving him a death glare and they slowly shuffled away, leaving the crowd.

Randy was paralyzed; what did his dad say? No longer part of the family?

'DAD!' Ignoring the pulls behind him, Randy stood up and fought against the Norrisvillains on his way towards his parents, pushing away the people who blocked his path. They however, started to closely pack together so that his attempt to reach the man and the woman became harder, still chanting the 'Shoob' call.

'Mom! Dad!' he called from the group in tears. 'You two didn't mean this, right?' The two figures of his parents quietly vanished into the black dome's darkness.

'You have brought disgrace to our family!' a loud but weak voice rang inside the dome. 'No one deserved you!' another spoke. 'We don't need you, Randy Cunningham!'

Hearing those voices, Randy was totally depressed and no longer aware to Norrisville's residents who kept distracting him from his parents. The Sorcerer sensed this and shouted out happily in his prison, 'Loss of beloved ones! Now, behold: the power of GRIEF!'

An invisible, agonizing force suddenly shot inside Randy's mind, causing him to let out a woeful cry of pain and he fell onto the floor, dropping his sai which clanked beside him and he stared at the bleary faces of the people around him with full of hatred. He was immobilized, thanks to whatever had hit his head just now. The giant dome that trapped him broke into its original form, the clouds of the Sorcerer's black stank before sneakily entered the boy's body through his nose and mouth, making its way to his heart.

Randy could see the Norrisvillains disappeared from his view until Howard was left, still laughing and he shook his fists in anger. It was your fault, Howard, he thought. You've made me to drown in this sea of sorrowfulness.

Slowly, the outlines of Norrisville High School returned but his ex-biffer was still in front of him. By the time the school was back to normal, he finally saw the Ninja-Nomicon. At the ginger's feet was his blue satchel, its inside was glowing in a faint red colour.

'Nomicon,' Randy whispered as the air entered him along with the black stank, reaching out his right hand for the bag but he was too weak to do that. 'Goodbye.'

He then closed his eyes, unaware Howard Weinerman turned into wisps of the black stank and went inside him as well.

(line break)

Hannibal McFist and his assistant, Willem Viceroy III had their jaws dropped. Not because the heavy rainstorm outside the former's building, but the Evil McChine on the long office desk inside the McFist's room was lighting up the whole room that they hid from the red light, feeling scared yet strange with the scene.

'Oh no,' Viceroy said fearfully and handed his McFist Pad to his boss, who gaped even more. 'What's happened to the Ninja right now?' the blond asked; the Pad's screen showed the gun's progress had almost reached 100%. 'Don't ask me, I don't know!' the scientist replied frantically, gazing at his invention in fright.

'We must stop that McChine!' McFist pointed to the black-and-red machine on his desk. The dark-haired man nodded and made his way towards the Evil McChine when a beep was heard and the room suddenly went a bit dark again; the gun had stopped glowing. Viceroy looked at McFist, who joined him and shoved him his device, now having the word 'Complete' shown on the screen.

They stared at the Evil McChine for a while and the spectacled one spoke with a cough, placing his hands at his hips, 'Well, what do you know? The Evil Ninja's reign has now begun.' Both of them gazed at the gloomy clouds around Norrisville with worried faces, wondering what will happen the next day.

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***** \- will be revealed at the end of this fic


	10. The Deal

**Tenth chapter, and so far not bad. Anyway, let's celebrate it by giving reviews and your suggestions! Also, don't forget to read my new fic, "Behind the Forest"!**

* * *

It was pitch black, like the darkest night the Earth could ever had with no lights were on. That was what Randy thought when his eyes fluttered open, staring at the blank black space around him. He got up from his lying position, puzzling about his whereabouts.

'Already wake up, hmm, sonny?' a voice suddenly spoke, making him to slightly jump. 'W-who are you?' the boy asked, looking around with alarmed eyes. 'Behind you,' said the voice and Randy turned his head but he saw nothing. Something, a bunch of keys, Randy thought, was jingling; the sound spooked him a bit. Suddenly, two white eyes with no irises appeared from the deep darkness and he shuddered in fright. He knew those pair of eyes, and the person.

The Sorcerer.

'How're you now, young man? Feeling good?' the old wizard greeted. Randy could sense he was putting a smile as he talked, trying his best to make a casual conversation with him.

Who didn't even have the _slightest_ idea that he was actually the Ninja, his worst enemy.

'Yeah,' Randy finally replied after a while gazing at the Sorcerer's blank eyes, 'a bit.' 'Good, because we have something to talk about,' said the Sorcerer.

That sent the kid gulped in horror. What did the most badass villain in Norrisville want from him? Did he already know he was the famed hero of Norrisville? Oh, wait. The _fallen_ hero of Norrisville, he thought resentfully, remembering the Robo-Snake that sent him into disgrace.

'You probably have heard of me, didn't you?' the Sorcerer asked. 'Yes,' said Randy with an awkward nod. 'You're the Sorcerer, doing wreck havoc using people's negative feelings. Right?' he added in a nervous laugh, in case the man was suspicious with him.

'Smart lad,' he heard the wizard's weak yet thunderous voice. Randy let out a relieved sigh, glad that his secret was still safe and sound. 'So you must have known what I'm going to say in a moment.

'I heard your woes today,' the Sorcerer started. 'They aren't the ones I have been hearing for centuries. Those shrieks of misery, the pain of humility, cries of getting disgraced...I felt it was like the purest misery one had ever had.

Randy began to feel irritated with the man opposite him. Talking about his misfortunes to him as if they were his form of entertainment; if he had known, he would shut the wizard's mouth the second he spoke.

'For that, I think it's best to approach you using my gem here.' A whoosh suddenly rang inside whatever they were now and the faint grey glow in front of the Sorcerer's eyes made Randy to realize it was the black stank he'd saw in Norrisville High, trapping him inside its giant dome. He backed away as it quietly approached him and circled him, illuminating his frightened face to the Sorcerer for a while before it went back to its owner. The chains that linked to the handcuffs around the wizard's bony wrists shimmered as it moved.

'W-what do you want from me?' Randy asked, his voice quivered when he said. 'Nothing much,' replied the Sorcerer, his white eyes fell onto Randy's sapphire blue ones. There was a short silence before he continued, 'Let's make a deal.'

'A deal?' the teen repeated. Despite the poor lighting around them, he could see the Sorcerer was grinning at him, revealing his sickly yellow teeth.

'You have suffered much earlier today by those people who taunted you for your disgrace. I am deeply sympathized with what you've faced. I will let you to have this power of mine for you to do whatever you want to them-' the robed man pointing towards the black stank that was now swirling around him '– and in return, you will help me to do something.'

'What is it?' the boy asked even though he had already known what the Sorcerer's request was. The white-eyed smiled cunningly and spoke: 'Create chaos for me. Make them as much as you can, until this prison of mine shattered to pieces and I will escape from it!' His voice echoed around the room.

Randy's heart sank when he heard it and he lowered his head, not wanting the Sorcerer saw his doubted look. He was torn between his choices. Closing his eyes, he tried to think which option was better. Agreeing with the wizard, he will be a bad guy. Disagree: get prepared for the ultimate welcome party by Bash Johnson and everyone in Norrisville High the moment he set his foot into the school the next day.

He could hear their voices rang in his head, getting louder and louder in each second. Their hoots, jeers and laughter banged his brain that the rush of anger almost overtook him. He gripped his hands so hard his knuckles went white, shaking feverishly.

Suddenly, a click entered his mind and his eyes flung open; why can't he do it? Not everyone was good. There will be moments when people had had enough and will do whatever they can to seek one thing:

Revenge.

A wicked, small grin eventually crept into his visage. Of course, that would be wonk, working with the Sorcerer, but Randy had no other choice. He faced the old wizard again, who apparently was waiting for his answer and said, 'I...agree.'

The Sorcerer's smile widened and he was about to speak again when Randy interrupted, 'But you must _allow_ me to have your stank forever when you're finally free, Sorcerer. Are you OK with that?'

The former was surprised, especially when he looked at the boy's eyes; they were now ruby red instead of his pair of blue eyes he'd seen just now. He felt strange with it, yet again his joy shooed away his doubts. "Finally, someone I can hope for my freedom rather than those two!" he thought happily.

'Fine,' he said. 'You're in. After all, that was what I'm going to tell you.' His black stank went towards Randy again, who this time was excited with its sight and the cloud swirled around his wrists.

'Don't worry, Sorcerer,' Randy told the Sorcerer as he stared at the stank; his eyes glinted beneath his dark hair, 'you can count on me. I promise you won't regret your choice to give me this.'

'Very well,' said the old wizard, pretty much satisfied with the kid's words. 'You better get ready, young man. The deal will start...Now.'

Without warning, the black stank made its way into Randy's body, suffocating him and once again, he was on the floor. He could feel it traveled to his heart, which hurt him to death. In the terrible pain, he saw his schoolmates' faces swam before his eyes, howling with laughter.

'All of you...will pay on what you've done,' the boy muttered in full of hatred; his eyes shone balefully before he let out a cry of agony and finally passed out, seeing the Sorcerer's pair of white eyes slowly consumed by the darkness.


	11. Birth of a Sorcerer

The Sun shone brightly as it rose into Norrisville the next morning. Dewdrops were dripping almost continuously from the trees' leaves as a result of last night's storm. Birds chirped happily, flying from a tree to another with hopes to get some early snacks. The Sun's yellow rays broke into each building and homes through the gaps of the windows and doors, causing the town's citizens to get up lazily from their beds and went to prepare for the day.

Inside a room of a house with dark purple roof and light-brown wall at Norrisville's neighbourhood, a bulging object was on the two-seat sofa, fully covered by a fluffy blue blanket. The room was a bit messy; there were books scattering on the floor. A grey hoodie and a blue satchel were on a wooden round table; the bag was on top of the jacket since it was placed too near at the edge of the table that it could fall anytime. Two video games' joysticks lay still on the light purple carpet below the table along with a pair of purple zip-up shoes. Other than that, it was a typical teenager's room, with a bed, shelves and a clothes' wardrobe.

Eventually, the yellow light of the Sun shone onto the room's only window and its reflected ray hit the hidden object.

Suddenly, it moved; first a wince, then a roll. Finally, with a slight push, the blanket fell onto the wooden floor, revealing a teen boy in his red shirt and pair of black pants who was now stretching himself on the sofa.

He opened his sleepy eyes and stifled a yawn before turning to his right, squinting as he gazed at the intense light outside; the light was rather too bright to be seen with the naked eye. Two butterflies were fluttering in circles gracefully as if they were chasing each other against the window, making him to smile a bit.

_Such a nice morning_, he thought and he looked at his surroundings. The wooden round table at the middle of the room, the bunk bed at the corner, the joysticks...

...he was in his room.

Surprised, the boy sat bolt upright in the blue sofa with his eyes scanned the whole room. It _was_ his room. But how did he get in? He was in Norrisville High School last night, locked. Or else, he could have been imagining he was. Still...

'Randy?' a female voice spoke from outside his room and a soft knock tapped against the blue door of the room, which interrupted the teen's deep thoughts and he woke up from his trance. 'Y-yeah?' he called back hesitantly.

'School's almost start, you better get up now,' she said. 'I'm already awake, Mom,' Randy replied half-heartedly. 'Well, get hurry then.'

Randy sat still on his sofa, waiting for the front door to be opened by his mom and was closed again. Right at the moment he heard the rather loud click downstairs, he bolted towards his wardrobe and hastily took one of the red McTops and a pair of black McSkinnies hanging inside and grabbed his red towel before dashing out of his room to have his bath.

The house was silent for a quite long while until a shout suddenly erupt all over it that even the birds that were perching peacefully on the trees' branches outside took flight in such fright.

Inside the bathroom, Randy was wide-eyed in horror as he saw his reflection on the mirror, already finished taking his bath and had his fresh clothes on, his towel was hanging around his neck. 'No,' he kept mumbling in disbelief, backing away from the looking glass. 'No.' Giving himself a strong pinch at the right arm, Randy hoped it was just a dream, some sort of nightmare that he will wake up from, but no. He was real. The reflection was real.

Randy stopped and stared at his image in full of confusion. He was no longer tyrian purple-haired and had the usual cheerful sapphire blue eyes. Instead, his hair was now snow-white and the irises of his eyes turned ruby red, which made the boy look like he was doing a death glare that even himself felt uneasy with the look. His skin was ghostly pale, and there were shadows under his eyes.

Scared with his new look, Randy took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying to remember what happened the day before, before he was knocked out into the world of unconsciousness. A few memories flashed in his mind; a giant Robo-Snake, an orange-haired stout boy shouted out some angry inaudible words, a bright yellow-orange light and a buff kid with brown hair who was laughing with all his heart, which was then accompanied by thousands of faceless people howling in cruelty.

Something black appeared among the flashbacks and his eyes flung open in utter terror, he realized that he was being stanked by his arch-enemy, the Sorcerer. And he wasn't destanked yet.

Horrified with the fact he was the evil wizard's victim, Randy wanted to continue shouting till his voice went croaky but he then remembered his dream last night. He had a chat with the robed man, talking about his misery. The Sorcerer gave him, one of his powers, the black stank to help him make his revenge and he have to do chaos in return.

_Chaos_, Randy thought with the memory of people calling him names began to haunt him again. A wisp of warm breath escaped his mouth and he spoke in a cold, cunning voice, 'Maybe it wasn't bad at all.' He smiled and walked out from the bathroom.

Putting his red towel on the two-seated sofa in his room, the boy's eyes fell onto the books that were on the floor. Groaning and rolling his eyes in annoyance, he was about to pick them when a spark of light suddenly blinded him, causing him to shield his face with his left arm and as he slowly lowered his arm, he saw something that made his jaw dropped.

A cloud of black-and-red gas was collecting the scattered books one by one, sometimes swirling in circles as it picked each of them and circled the whole room to search for more dropped things.

Randy only watched in awe as the gas moved silently and when every book was gathered, the cloud went to his book shelf and started placing each one neatly in an empty row of the furniture. The time the last book was placed, it went towards Randy, who was rather scared and astonished; the cloud was around his hands.

As he gazed the black-and-red stank, he remembered the Sorcerer's words to him: _'I will let you to have this power of mine to do whatever you want to them...' _It was his stank, he thought happily. His _own_ stank.

Randy started firing his new powers all over his room, watching joyfully as his messy room was being cleaned in just a moment. The blue blanket he had used last night was folded on its own and went towards his bunk bed to be placed there, and his pair of McKicks was floating in front of him, in which he took them happily and put them on.

A beep from his digital clock on the book shelf cut in his joy and he said with a moan, 'Ah, I forgot I'm already late for school!' He grabbed his blue satchel and his grey hoodie, which immediately turned into a black one with red cuffs and pockets and started wearing the jacket when the Ninja-Nomicon fell out of the bag. With a grumble, he knelt and picked it up and his eyes drooped.

He had failed it by being the laughing stock of Norrisville, the town where almost two hundred people of its citizens had become the famous Norrisville Ninja since 800 years ago. Feeling humiliated, he placed it aside and dug his satchel for his Ninja Mask. After a while, he found the feathery mask and took the Nomicon as well before he stood up and swung open his wardrobe.

'You don't deserve me, Nomicon,' said Randy. 'I'm not worthy for you.' He put his Ninja items in the upper row of the cupboard and stared at them with sad eyes before he closed the wardrobe's door, swinging his satchel over his shoulder and left his bedroom.

He went downstairs and took two pieces of peanut butter-jammed sandwiches his mom had prepared on the kitchen table and stepped out of the house, locking the dark-red door with his own key (Mrs. Cunningham had given him that so he didn't have to wait for her if she was home late) and began walking to Norrisville High School, putting the key inside the pocket of his McSkinnies. Knowing people will start talking about his new look, he put his hood on and zipped his hoodie.

Randy felt quite miserable, leaving his Ninja Mask at home but he shoved the thought away when Norrisville's citizens taunted voices rang back in his head. 'Today, there will be no Ninja coming for you, Norrisville. Not anymore.' he said with a tone of hatred, his red eyes suddenly shone brightly beneath his hood.


	12. A Partner in Crime

Randy ate his sandwiches and looked around as he headed to Norrisville High School. Some kids who were a few steps behind him exchanged strange glances at him when he eyed them beneath his black hood and started whispering to each other, which made him feeling annoyed.

'What's wrong with them?' he grumbled, wolfing down the last bits of his breakfast and rubbed his both hands onto his black hoodie. 'Can't I wear these?' He looked down at his new clothes; his jacket had some breadcrumbs on it. 'Sheesh.' He then brushed them away.

Putting his hands into his hoodie's red pockets, Randy started whistling, sometimes glancing with full of hatred at the group of kids who were still gossiping from the corner of his eyes. Two butterflies were hovering before his eyes and he felt glad with it before they left moments later. At least his mind was off from kept thinking about those shoobs.

Soon, after walking for what seemed like eternity, the white-and-blue building of Norrisville High gradually appeared in front of him and he sighed in relief, feeling quite tired even though he already had breakfast. The moment he set his right foot onto the first step of the school's stairs, he froze, not noticing the group of kids that talked about him passing by him, glimpsing at him in puzzlement. His body was trembling and his breaths became shallow.

Randy lifted up his head in horror and he saw the shadowy figures of Norrisville's citizens looming over the school were breaking into great laughter, sneering at him. He rubbed his eyes to make sure he wasn't dreaming, but the spectres continued to jeer to him. The memories from the day before started to haunt him again, now flashing vividly in his mind.

_No,_ he thought. _I can't come here. I have to leave._

Terrified, he began to step backwards but something blocked his path. Slowly and timidly, the hooded boy turned around, only to see a pale boy (but not as pale as him) who was taller than him dressed as a gothic (badly) with a top hat on his head and wearing all dark blue and purple was facing him with a strange look. His fangs that poke out of his mouth made Randy to convince they were not real (since there isn't anyone who had such _long_ fangs). (Unless they got them naturally.)

'Hello there,' the kid greeted in a somewhat "creepy" tone. 'Hi,' said Randy awkwardly and pulled his own shirt's collar nervously.

'New student, hmm? Julian's the name by the way,' the gothic boy spoke, taking a head-to-toe glance at him and held out his hand, in which Randy returned and they shook hands.

'Wait a second...' Julian said, lowering his hand and bent closer to Randy, who was perplexed with his sudden action, stroking his chin. 'I think I know you.' His eyes widened. 'You're...'

Before Julian could finish his sentence, Randy clamped his mouth with both hands and injured himself a bit, thanks to the kid's stupid fake fangs and dragged him to the bushes near the school in difficulty since Julian was wriggling to escape. Finally hidden from anyone's view, he let go of the boy, who fell onto the ground and gasped for breath the moment he released his grasp.

'W-why did you do that?' Randy heard Julian choke as he said between his coughs. The former didn't answer; he waited until the blue-haired boy recovered himself and nursed his hands, which had trickles of blood from the cut he had using his stank. Seeing it, Julian gawped in amazement and gulped before standing up, brushing off the dirt on his clothes and said enthusiastically, 'That was bruce-city! How did you do that? You learn healing magic?'

'What did you say just now?' asked Randy and stretched out his whitish hands, now fully healed by the black-and-red stank before it vanished into thin air and facing the blue-eyed teen menacingly, causing him to cower in fright.

'I said, "You learn healing magic"?' Julian repeated his last sentence with a faint squeak. 'Not that one,' told the white-haired, placing his hands into his pants' pockets. 'The one before I dragged you here.'

'Oh, that,' the gothic boy let out a girlish giggle for a while and went on in his airy tone, 'Let's see..."I think I know you"?' 'Yes.'

'So tell me Julian, who am I?' Randy asked, holding Julian's pointed chin and stared into his frightened cougar blue eyes. The taller boy scanned all over him to see whether he was true about knowing the kid in front of him before. The pair of zip-up McKicks, the blue satchel which strip hanging on his left shoulder, the hairstyle which he recognized even though he wore a hood to conceal part of his hair...

'You're Randy Cunningham,' said Julian with eyes opened wide and Randy lifted his hand from his chin, smiling.

'You're right,' he said with a chuckle. Then, his eyes turned fully red and he gripped the dark-haired's shoulders and fixed his gaze onto the pair of blue eyes, grinning wickedly. Julian, who was too shocked with his sudden act grabbed Randy's shoulders in return but he could not do anything except to stare back as if he was being hypnotized.

Slowly, his eyes went red as well and he unconsciously lessened his grip and his arm flailing beside him and he hunched a bit. Randy however, was beaming at the boy opposite him, his eyes went back to have only his irises were red.

'Can you hear me, Julian?' he asked. 'Yes,' replied Julian in an almost robotic voice, his head lolled aside slightly. Randy walked towards him and whispered at his left ear, 'No one must know I am Randy Cunningham. I'm about to do something that will surprise everyone in school today. Can you do that?'

'Of course,' said the possessed Julian and the wizard's smile went even wider.

'Good, because right now Julian my friend, you are under my control.'


	13. The Lion-Bot

Inside the tallest building in downtown Norrisville, the pyramid-shaped McFist Industries, a person was working on a large figure in a spacious dark room. He grunted as he tightened the shiny nuts at the object using a giant spanner, causing a deafening creak to echo around the room.

Suddenly, the room's door opened, revealing a man wearing rectangle-shaped spectacles in a light purple lab coat kneeling on the floor, apparently surprised at the sight of being discovered. Behind him was a giant yellow lion robot, and the spanner was hanging at the nut of the bot's front right leg.

'What the juice, Viceroy? Calling me in the early morning; you've disturbed my sleep! Did you look what time is it now? It's 8 in the morning!' moaned Hannibal McFist, the town's gazillionnaire groggily while rubbing his sleepy eyes and turned on the light before entering the room and sat on a stool beside the scientist and fumed, already wearing his usual business suit. 'And why did you work in the dark? You could've bumped into something dangerous.'

'Sorry,' spoke the man and stood up, looking at his newest creation and tapping his chin. 'I just want to surprise you, Hannibal.' 'What for?'

'Oh, you know,' replied the dark-haired airily and faced his boss. 'We haven't worked on something really remarkable yet.' 'So...?' asked the blond, quite clueless. 'So, I think it's great for us to work on this together.'

'ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!' bellowed McFist that Viceroy had to shut his ears. 'I'M NOT DOING THIS!' he continued. 'MACHINERY? THIS IS **YOUR** JOB, VICEROY, NOT MINE! I'M GOING BACK TO SLEEP AND YOU CAN'T MAKE ME!'

McFist got up from the stool in fury and was about to walk out of the room when Viceroy said, 'It's for the Ninja.' 'Sorry?'

'The Ninja,' repeated Viceroy with a sigh and began to tighten the nut at the robot lion again. 'We don't know whether he was still fully conscious or not. I made this Lion-Bot so that we can know if he had already turned bad or else when we send it to attack the school this morning.'

'And why did you need my help?' asked McFist suspiciously but in a tone of interest and he went back towards his assistant. 'Because the Robo-Apes cannot turn these nuts well when I asked them to do this last night. Looks like their arms cannot stand the high exert of energy needed to turn them,' explained the tall man.

'Ooooohhh,' said the stocky-built man, nodding. 'So, where do I start?' He rubbed his hands excitedly.

'Here. You can start with that one.' Viceroy handed him another giant spanner and pointed at the Lion-Bot's left hind leg before he was back to work. McFist took it, weighing the heavy spanner in his hands for a while and went to where Viceroy ordered him before placing it to the nut at the robot's leg and started pulling the spanner with all his might.

'Hey, Viceroy?' he called after a few minutes. 'Yeah?' said Viceroy, grunting again. 'What about the other two?' 'They're already done. Took me almost an hour on each.'

The two men worked in silence for almost two hours and both heaved a relieved sigh when their job was done, staring at the Lion-Bot proudly.

'Not bad, huh?' spoke the one in the purple lab coat. 'Yeah,' replied the blond. 'Although it was rather awkward, you know; working with no talking.' He shrugged, making the scientist to chuckle and said, 'That is the best way to work: no interruptions are around.' He then took out his McFist Pad from his coat's pocket and switched it on.

'If you want to know, we can actually control this,' said Viceroy to his boss and pressed the 'On' button appeared on his Pad's screen. The Lion-Bot's eyes suddenly glowed in green light, and McFist gaped at it. 'Are you saying this is just a giant toy lion-robot?' he asked. 'Yes. But here's something else.'

'Check this out: sit,' the spectacled commanded and the robot sat. 'Roar.' It let out a loud roar that the whole room almost shook. 'That's a good one,' said McFist impressively when Viceroy ordered the robot lion to stop and the dark-haired pulled out a smug smile when he heard it.

'When are we going to set this loose to the school?' he asked, patting the Lion-Bot's front leg. 'Maybe during the first lesson,' the scientist babbled, focusing on his McFist Pad. 'Or at lunchtime.'

'Speaking of time, why don't we have breakfast first?' suggested the blond. 'Good thinking,' said his henchman and they headed out of the room. The Lion-Bot meanwhile, curled up itself and went to doze off.

The two men walked in the corridor without talking to each other and McFist started to feel awkward once again.

'So, uh...got any news about the Ninja?' he decided to break the silence after a long while, glancing at one of the numerous Robo-Apes that worked in McFist Industries lifting a box and his black eyes trailed onto it when it passed by them before he looked ahead again.

'So far, no,' replied Viceroy in a monotonous voice and they stopped at the elevator, which slid open and they went inside, watching the silver doors closed and the machine began to move upwards. 'I've stayed up last night to see whether there is any change at the Evil McChine, but no.'

'We need to be careful, then,' murmured McFist with a hint of worry. 'Who knows, maybe the Ninja is up to do something today.' 'Indeed,' the one in the lab coat agreed. Soon, the lift reached its destination and they stepped into McFist's office, where a tray having two plates full of pancakes with a jug of tea along with two mugs was waiting for them, ready to be served.

'However, let's forget the Ninja for a while; have breakfast instead,' the gazillionnaire said and sat onto his comfy chair, beckoning Viceroy to do so on a chair opposite him. He offered one of the plates to his pal, who took it gladly and they started eating, sometimes talking about high school years and guffawed heartily like the normal days they usually had, not even worrying about the Ninja, who was now plotting a way to cause mayhem in Norrisville High School.


	14. Randy's Little Revenge

'So, what should I call you, Master Randy? You know, as a cover?' whispered Julian a bit nervously to Randy, who was staring around the school's lobby as they walked into their school, Norrisville High. The hooded boy gazed at him for a moment and went back to see forwards before he answered with a smile, 'How about _you_ suggest a name for me?'

'I don't think I can,' the gothic hesitated. 'I'm rubbish at giving names, and now you ask me to do one?' 'Any names will do, Julian,' said Randy half-heartedly and headed towards the door of the right row of the lockers that lined up inside the vast room, swung it open and entered one of Norrisville High's corridors, followed by Julian.

'Let's see...how about, "Ben Watson"?' asked the blue-haired eagerly. 'No,' replied one with the blue satchel. 'I don't like the sound of it.' '"Ricky Houston"?' Randy shook his head.

'Aha! "John Wagner"!' 'Too posh; I don't want to be everyone's attention.'

'What then? I'm already out of ideas!' Julian raised his voice that the students who were along the corridor gave them a glare before going back to their business. '"Cory Russell",' Randy mumbled out. 'Excuse me?'

'Cory Russell, call me that. Not sounding too much to attract people, hmmm?' said Randy, giving Julian a grin and kept walking, leaving the gothic boy to gawp as if he fell into a trance for a second before he shouted, 'Hey, wait up!' and trailed after the white-haired.

'Act like usual, Julian. Like I'm a new kid on the block and you just happened to be the first to meet me,' Randy told him, who only nodded as he finally caught up and started, 'So, Cory, what do you think about Norrisville?'

'Norrisville, hmmm? Not bad, but I can't wait to carry out my plan,' said the hooded kid and clasped both his hands, his red eyes shone in hunger beneath his hood.

'What plan?' Julian spoke but Randy clamped his mouth once again. 'I can't tell anyone,' Randy said in a rather husky voice which could make girls swoon, 'it's supposed to be a secret.' The gothic boy muffled out something, making him to let go and Julian choked out, 'At least you tell me.' 'No.'

'Oh, come on!' the kid in purple started to moan, but suddenly his voice didn't come out. He looked at Randy in terror; the wizard was pointing to his throat. 'Do not argue against me,' he said each word balefully and lowered his hand, making Julian's voice to return and he let out a squeak, kneeling on the blue-tiled floor and massaged his neck. Randy then left him alone, heading to his locker near the flight of stairs at the end of the corridor but his way was blocked by four kids, two of them were stocky, one was quite tall and the other was short, all smirking at him.

'Look who's here,' someone with a gruff voice spoke and he looked up in fear, seeing Bash Johnson and his gang of bullies, who were laughing. 'Hello, Bash,' Randy greeted with a slight stammer. He went to the blue-eyed's left side and Mick spanned out his arms. He shifted to the right and the two kids were there.

He was trapped. _Again_. By the same group who had put him into the second wave of humiliation in his chapter of accidents yesterday.

Randy stepped back and cringed, feeling fear was taking over him. He didn't want the whole thing repeated itself. _If only I can get out of this mess_, he thought with a gulp.

Suddenly, he saw something. Not the usual brightly coloured doodles he usually caught when he tried to solve a problem. Instead, they were numbers and lines and equations that neither he himself could understand.

He only stared out at the symbols and when his eyes fell back onto Bash, a sentence was floating on the kid's head:

_**Find something that will scare him to death.**_

But then he asked himself: what _is_ Bash Johnson afraid of? He scanned the rows of lockers at his left and he couldn't believe it: he got X-rayed eyes. He saw literally everything in almost every locker; unfinished nachos, some pictures of boys (which he guessed was a girl's), Bucky Hensletter got stuck in one (two lockers away from Mick), and other things he didn't like to describe.

He lowered his face and caught a glimpse of a cockroach, its feelers were moving randomly. Just inside the one Bash was leaning against.

He hid up a wicked smile before he focused onto the insect, which paralyzed the moment their eyes met (though he wasn't sure about that since there was the locker between him and it) and a while later, it was in a deep trance, just like what he did to Julian.

_Go to Bash_, he ordered using his mind. _And get into his shirt if you can_.

To his surprise, the roach apparently heeded his words and crawled out of the locker and headed towards the brown-haired, who was still smirking at him. Randy kept quiet and pretending to be scared with his eyes fixed onto the cockroach, not wanting the bully to know what he was up to.

It was now reaching the hem of his blue jeans and began to crawl upwards. _Just nice_, the hooded kid thought, an almost smile crept into his face and went on staring at it until it slipped into Bash's grey shirt.

The blue-eyed walked away from the locker he leant just now and approached him, putting on a winning smile along with his little gang. But out of sudden, he stopped, puzzling them all.

'I'm feeling something,' he spoke gruffly. 'Like, it tickles me.' He glanced over his body and Randy straightened his body, only watching as the other three helped the bully to search whatever was inside his shirt.

'Get it!' he heard Bash shout to his "bros" but then he saw the two feelers poking out of Bash's shirt's collar and he grinned maliciously as the boy looked downwards and saw the cockroach.

'AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGHHHH!' A long howl of fright that rang inside the corridor went out of Bash's mouth and the freshman couldn't help it except to stare in amusement at the brown-haired, who was trying to bat the insect out of his clothes. Mick and the other two however, started to back away from him.

Feeling happy with his little revenge, Randy walked past him and the second he passed by Mick (who stood the farthest of them all), he whispered before he left the scene, 'Get him.'

Immediately, swarms of cockroaches coming out of nowhere headed towards Bash, whose eyes were horrified and surrounded him, slowly creeping onto him while the red-eyed kid placed a satisfied smile as he heard his shrieks and the students' laughter when they knew what happened.


	15. Attack in the School

'Oh my dear Bash, don't worry, Mom's here, there's nothing to be afraid of,' said Marci McFist softly as if trying to comfort her son, Bash, who still got a terrified look in his face and huddled at his mother like a baby inside Principal Slimovitz's room, along with her husband, Hannibal McFist half an hour after school started (McFist threw a tantrum the second he heard the news, forcing his assistant Willem Viceroy III to calm him).

'How could this happen, Slimovitz?' the man with the robotic right arm asked the spectacled man sitting opposite him, resting his left arm onto the principal's wooden table, referring to his stepson.

Norrisvile High School's head teacher, Irving Slimovitz tugged his shirt's collar nervously before answering, 'To be honest Mr. McFist, I don't even know how it happened. All I knew is that a few kids come telling me Bash was swarmed by cockroaches (the bully flinched as he heard "cockroaches") and we told the janitor to spray them as much as he could, but looks like they're quite resistant to aerosols, so he and some of the students whacked them all using brooms. He's still cleaning up the mess if you wanna have a look.' He pointed at his room's door.

'No, thanks; we didn't wish to see the bits,' Hannibal said hastily, glancing at Marci and her boy. 'Did you know who did it?' 'No, but some of the kids in the hallway said he and his little gang confronted a boy dressed in black and red before the incident.'

'Find him, then. He spooked the cheese of him.' Principal Slimovitz only nodded, twiddling his fingers nervously as he watched the McFists stood up and left his room; Bash was turning paler than ever. He then let out a deep sigh, wondering about the cockroach incident.

(line break)

'That was awesome!' Julian praised Randy after they witnessed the horrible event, now heading to their first class, Science. 'How did you do that? You must teach me; I'm dying to learn bruce magic from you, Randall!' He giggled feverishly, but Randy pointed at his throat again with a death glare and he stopped.

'Can you just keep quiet, Julian?' Randy said in faint annoyance and lowered his hand. 'But I – ' the gothic kid started but he cut in, 'If you want to learn this from me, shut your mouth until I told you not to. Agree?'

'Of course,' the dark-haired quivered as he spoke; the hooded teen's eyes glinted evilly as they stared his and they climbed up the two flights of stairs before entering Norrisville High's science lab.

The moment they stepped into the room, all eyes were fixing onto Randy, some of them gawping while the others began whispering to each other.

'All right everyone, sit down,' a sweet, rather weak voice of a woman spoke from behind Randy and Julian, making they jumped and rushed towards the only table that was not occupied yet. 'Miserable torture, she is,' he caught Julian whispering to him as they sat. 'Forcing us to listen whatever she was droning about.'

Randy gazed at the speaker, a woman with grey askew hair now entering the lab with a full skeleton wheeled on a stand and stopped at her desk. He snorted; she was Marilyn Driscoll, the spooky teacher whose husband, Jerry was already dead years ago but she didn't bury him and have been dragging him along since ever. _Wonder if I could animate him to life again_, he formed a thought, suppressing his smile.

'Are you a new student?' Mrs. Driscoll asked out of the blue and pointed towards Randy. Everyone's heads immediately turned to him. Surprised, he got up from his seat abruptly and blurted, 'What? Oh, yes I am.' He pulled out his best toothy grin to her.

'Well, perhaps you can start by introducing yourself first,' said the teacher. 'It's OK, you can stay at your seat,' she added when she noticed him about to go to the front of the class and started rummaging her white lab coat for her loyal piece of chalk.

'Name's Cory. Cory Russell. You can call me Cory or Russell or anything else you'd like to call me with,' Randy said with a snicker, placing his hands into his hoodie's pockets. 'Just moved here couple of days ago, I hope you guys can help me around this town.' His eyes fell onto a chubby boy with orange hair who was staring at him with eyebrows knitted.

'No problem, matey. As long as you're chill with us, we're gonna chill back at ya,' someone said coolly and the others chimed in agreement. 'I guess that will do for now?' asked Mrs. Driscoll, already found her chalk. 'Yes, Mrs. Driscoll,' the students in the room replied.

'That's a pretty convincing lie, Randall,' Julian mumbled to Randy as he sat back onto his seat. 'Shut up, Julian,' the red-eyed threatened and focused on the lesson Mrs. Driscoll was babbling at the front.

'As you know, the blood in our body flows from right to left, through the vena cava at the right side of the heart and...'

(line break)

Howard Weinerman turned his Science book in boredom and yawned; he always did in every Science lesson. His eyes swayed back and forth to whatever Mrs. Driscoll wrote on the blackboard. He glanced at his side, some kids had their heads on the table already.

He let out a sigh; he had never felt so low-spirited before. Since he ditched Cunningham, his world turned bleak: Heidi reported about his schoolwork, Mort was backing her up and took his McConsole and won't return it if he didn't finish his work.

He turned around and saw the kid called himself "Cory Russell" was jotting down some notes and grunted. _New kids, heh_, he thought and continued looking at him. His pale skin caught Howard's attention; did he ever go out in the sun? And his red eyes too, glinting in curiosity. But what he found the _most_ disturbing of the new kid was that he wore a hood, concealing his hair.

Howard went back to his book and moaned before he flickered the book, his mind was full with Cory's heads. _He's quite familiar_, Howard thought.

Couldn't stand the increasing boredom in Mrs. Driscoll's class, Howard slumped his head on the table and joined the rest to the dream world, unaware the white-haired was the only one who stay awoke for the rest of the class.

(line break)

Inside McFist Industries, Willem Viceroy III was slurping his cup of coffee inside his boss's room when his phone suddenly rang and he took it, seeing "Hannibal McBoss" was on the screen, calling him and he answered the call. 'McFist Industries, Willem Viceroy III speaking,' he greeted.

'Viceroy, I want you to set the Lion-Bot to the school now,' McFist's voice spoke through the other end of the line and Viceroy slightly spilled his coffee onto his purple lab coat. 'What?' Quite confused, he asked and placed his cup onto McFist's table. 'Why? I thought we'd agreed to do it at recess time!'

'Listen up Viceroy, someone had scared that stepson of mine out of his wits and he didn't want to go until he pounded the kid who did it to fists,' McFist lowered his voice. 'Who was it, then?'

'The principal said it was a kid wearing all black and red,' explained the blond man and he gasped for a while and continued, 'Are you saying...the Ninja was the suspect?'

'It could be; that's why I want you to send the bot NOW!' the gazillionnaire bellowed that Viceroy held his phone away from his ear. 'Fine,' he said in a defeated voice. 'You want it _now_ now or...' 'I SAID "NOW" JUST NOW, VICEROY!'

(line break)

Randy and Julian walked out of the science lab an hour later, the latter yawned and pinched his arm a bit and asked the white-haired, 'How can you not fall asleep in her class?' 'The topic intrigued me for some reason, thought I can't explain why,' Randy replied and shrugged. Actually, the weird symbols he'd seen while facing Bash were playing before his eyes again and he couldn't swat them away, though they're quite helpful in explaining stuffs he wanted to understand about the circulatory system. Even better than the teacher herself.

Suddenly, a strong force shook the whole school that they fell onto the blue-tiled floor. 'Wh-what happened?' Julian asked shakily but Randy raced for the window to see what happened.

A giant yellow lion robot was clawing into Norrisville High's walls repeatedly, and the sight of it marking the daily routine of the people around the school:

Waiting for the Norrisville Ninja to finish it off.


	16. Norrisville's New Villain

Randy only watched with his mouth slightly opened as the yellow robot lion started wreaking havoc outside Norrisville High School by trampling onto some cars (not Principal Slimovitz's), clawing onto the school's walls and dug the ground furiously.

Seeing the students were walking out of the white building, he wondered for a while before the sight of a red scarf a lavender-haired girl wore around her neck reminded him: they were waiting for the Ninja to show up.

He swiftly grabbed his blue satchel and rummaged his Ninja mask inside it but he stopped seconds later; he remembered he had left his Ninja gears at home that morning. He mentally facepalmed and told himself, "How can I forget that?!" A moan interrupted his thoughts and he turned around, seeing the gothic boy Julian was on the floor, holding his head.

'Wh-what happened, Randy?' he asked, straightening his purple hat and got up before going beside Randy and let out a gasp and hugged him in sudden, which startled Randy, and he shivered in fright.

'Lions,' Randy heard him mumble, 'I'm terrified of them; I almost got mauled once at the zoo.' The white-haired frowned and lifted his gaze from Julian to the kids outside Norrisville High, who were now chanting the word 'Ninja' as if the hero of the town will come whenever they call for him.

'Ninja! Ninja! Ninja!' they cheered happily, watching the Lion-Bot tried to pull a tree out of the ground using its mouth and it tumbled when the tree was pulled out. "Not this time, Norrisville," he thought bitterly and faced away, recalling the moment when he was humiliated during being the Ninja and began walking away from the window with the dark-haired was still clinging around him.

'Where are we going?' asked Julian as Randy dragged him passing by some students in the corridor who gave them a strange look and entered another hallway but the boy didn't answer him. 'Er…Randy?' he whispered.

'Just keep-' the red-eyed spoke a bit urgently and he stopped with his face slowly lit up when he saw it.

The bathroom.

'Why are we here?' Julian said in puzzlement and let go of Randy, knitting his eyebrows at him.

'Listen up Julian, I want you to stay here,' said Randy, holding his shoulders. 'You mean I have to be in the loo?' the gothic kid blurted, pointing towards the bathroom's blue door.

'No, _I_ want to use it,' the white-haired hunched a bit and lowered his hands before started stepping backwards and swung open the blue door and entered the loo, grinning and said, 'Don't let anyone come in here, will you? I'm counting on you, Julian.' He smiled and closed the door. A click told Julian one thing: he couldn't go in.

'Alright,' he moaned and slid down onto the blue-tiled floor. 'Go ahead, do whatever you want inside. I'll be fine here, guarding a _bathroom_.' He laughed haughtily and sighed seconds later. "Wonder what does Randall do in there?" he asked himself but then he shrugged and hummed some creepy tones he knew by heart while fiddling his thumbs, trying to entertain himself.

Inside the toilet, Randy put his satchel in a sink, lowering his hood and went towards the room's drain hole and knelt, saying, 'I'm about to do some chaos, Sorcerer. Hope you won't mind if I took your place today.' He stood up and cast his black-red stank, which illuminated his visage and it changed into a hand-drill. Placing its tip onto the white wall of the room, Randy took a deep breath and started drilling the wall, sometimes stopped to flex his tired arms.

'How thick is this wall, really?' he muttered in annoyance between his breaths as he took his fifth break.

Finally, after seemed like an eternity, a hole which size was enough for him to peek outside was bore on it and he wiped beads of sweat on his forehead with his hoodie's sleeve, giving out a relieved sigh. The hand-drill turned back into its original form and he ordered, 'Get the bot. Time for today's entertainment.'

(line break)

Inside McFist Industries, the mad scientist Willem Viceroy III was giving orders to his newest creation, the Lion-Bot while listening to his favourite McFist Tunes, "I Want It All".

'Turn around,' he mumbled, his legs jingled to the song's rhythm. 'Scratch the walls. Do a roar.' He could hear a faint roar from outside the building and he smiled. Drinking his coffee, he suddenly frowned. _The Ninja should've come by now_, he thought and placed his cup onto McFist's table. He took his McPhone and called his boss.

'What do you want, Viceroy?' the usual gruff voice of Hannibal McFist spoke from the other end of the line. 'Is the Ninja there?' he asked.

'No, he isn't here yet,' McFist replied. There was a short pause before the businessman continued, 'Eh, who knows, he might be a bit busy today.' Viceroy raised his eyebrows when he heard it.

'Do call me if something happens there.' 'Of course,' his boss's dull voice said before he ended the call and folded his arms. He gazed at the Evil McChine he leant against the wall beside him.

_Wish I didn't make you_, he said to himself and stared outside, thinking about the Norrisville Ninja.

(line break)

Randy's stank whooshed out of the bathroom through the hole he had made and headed to the Lion-Bot, which was stomping on two red cars. It gradually transformed into a handsome deer and approached the robot sneakily. The yellow machine didn't notice it until it was quite close to its hind legs and it turned aside, seeing a deer and stopped. As if fell into a trance, the Lion-Bot walked slowly towards the stank-made deer, which stepped back until Randy could see the robot.

'Stop,' he commanded and the deer didn't move. The robot, being puzzled held out its paw and touched it.

'Just nice,' said Randy and his eyes glinted evilly.

The moment it made contact with the deer in front of it, Randy's eyes went fully red and the deer changed back into the black-red stank and surrounded the Lion-Bot, which was paralyzed and the robot was enhanced: it was bigger and had sharp metallic spikes poking out of its back. Its fangs and claws grew longer and its color had changed pretty much: it was now black and red.

'Destroy the school,' Randy ordered and he let out a mirthless laugh as the Lion-Bot started rampaging around Norrisville High, spreading fear to the people he had once protected.


	17. Howard's Suspicion

Viceroy was playing the game he had developed himself in his phone, "Grave Puncher: Grave Crush" when a loud boom interrupted his thoughts and he grumbled before lowering his gadget, seeing thick, grey clouds of smoke emerged from the place he knew very well.

Norrisville High School.

Feeling strange with the sight of the clouds, he got up and grabbed the pair of McPeepers from McFist's table drawer and peered into the school's compound as he sat back onto his chair. Students were entering the large white-and-blue building with such hurry and he immediately realized there was something wrong had happened there. He was about to reach for his McFist Pad on his boss's table when the tablet suddenly glowed red and he fell from his chair, startled. He got up moments later, adjusting his spectacles and saw three sentences were displayed on his Pad's screen:

_'**I've now took control of your machine that caused chaos in Norrisville High just now. Don't be afraid Viceroy, I just upgraded it a bit. Your bot can do more than what you thought.'**_

As soon as he finished reading the lines, the McFist Pad began to malfunction and he was taken aback when it turned to charred bits of metal and dust. A wisp of black-red mist floated before his eyes and vanished after a while. Terrified, he dialled McFist's number once again but his phone rang out of the blue and he almost dropped it in shock. 'Y-yes?' he answered, quivering.

'Hey Viceroy, I know that bot of yours is such a cheesy one, but looks like it's mad right now,' informed McFist and Viceroy's heart sank even more when he heard it. 'What do you mean?' he squeaked. 'It's destroying the school right now.' 'WHAT?'

'That's right Viceroy, that Lion-Bot is doing honkin' well in destroying stuffs, do you program it to do so?' asked Hannibal McFist in a monotonous voice and glancing outside of the town's high school. He and Norrisville High's students were currently in the school's lobby, hearing Principal Slimovitz babbled about his "Monster Drill" in which his wife, Marci McFist was listening to him with full of interest. Her son however, had lost in the crowd; they bet he had joined his group of friends. A number of missiles were falling into Norrisville High's compound, and had left huge holes on the ground as they exploded.

'It wasn't me,' the scientist murmured. 'What did you say just now? I can't hear you,' whispered the town's gazillionnaire, warily looked around him in case of someone overheard the conversation. 'I'm not controlling it anymore,' Viceroy told his boss with a heavy heart.

McFist's jaw dropped the moment he acknowledged the news. 'You gotta be kidding me,' he said in disbelief. 'I am not,' his henchman replied with a deep sigh. 'How's that so?' he asked in a worried tone. An ear-splitting shriek from the Lion-Bot forced everyone in the school to cover their ears and Viceroy immediately held his phone as far as he could, knowing that he could be deaf if he hadn't notice it.

Reluctantly, Viceroy told his boss about the message he got and his McFist Pad was turned to bits. 'Without my McFist Pad, it can no longer heed my words,' he finished. 'Do you get any clue about whoever was that anonymous? I mean, he knew your name, right?' said the blond. 'I want to say he was the Ninja, but that can be quite impossible,' replied the spectacled man. 'But it also can be him.' 'Indeed. Keep informing me if anything happens.'

The dark-haired man ended the call and fumed for a while before started rushing to his room, searching for his blueprint about the Evil McChine, his stolen robot filled his mind. Unaware to him, the gun-like device started to glow again, this time having speckles of black dots started to appear on its metallic body.

(line break)

Inside Norrisville High School's wide lobby, such noise occurred with students were packed together and a man who was probably in his late 40s was standing in front of them with a megaphone in his hand.

'Calm down, everyone,' Principal Irving Slimovitz repeated over and over again to the teenagers. 'Remember the N.I.N.J.A rule! Firstly, nobody panic. I said: nobody _panicked_!' he said shrilly using his megaphone. Some of them chose to ignore him and recorded the scene outside their school using their phones while the others chatted among themselves, mainly about the hero of Norrisville who seemed to disappear at the time they needed him the most.

And so did Howard Weinerman.

He didn't talk with his fellow schoolmates. Instead, he was thinking about his ex-best friend, Randy Cunningham. _Where was he?_ the boy thought and started scanning through the vast sea of people in the room but being short, he could not see someone with spiky tyrian purple hair. However, he did see his sister, Heidi, who was setting up her "MeCast" show, and he knew she wanted to broadcast the Ninja's disappearance to Norrisville's citizens.

Feeling disturbed with the increasing noise in the lobby and concerned with his childhood friend's whereabouts, Howard lay flat onto the red floor and made his way towards the door which led to another corridor by crawling in such difficulty. Once he reached his destination, he opened the door and closed it quickly so that no one knew he sneaked out of the room.

Howard walked along the hallway with his brown eyes swayed back and forth, hoping to catch a glimpse of Randy in every step he took. His paces became faster each minute and he just began to run when he spotted something purple in color in a corridor near the science lab and he stopped at a halt, recognizing the figure.

'Julian?'


	18. Dilemmas

Julian jumped when he heard his name being called, toppling his purple hat in accident and saw Howard stood across him. 'Oh, hello Howard,' he answered grimly and picked up his headpiece and placed it neatly on his head. 'What are you doing here?'

'_I_ am supposed to ask that,' said Howard and approached the blue-haired teen, who slightly shivered in fright but he hid it. 'So, what are you doing here?' asked the ginger, hands on his hips. 'I'm enjoying myself with creepiness of this place and our doom of being killed by that mad robot outside,' said Julian with a hint of sarcasm but Howard took no notice. 'And what about you?'

'Have you seen Cunningham today?' Howard questioned, almost taking the blue-haired boy off his guard.

'Why, of course not,' he replied with a nervous laugh. 'Always being away, is he?' 'Quite,' the brown-eyed said surly and he sighed. Then he shot Julian a glare and voiced, 'Who's in there?' He pointed towards the bathroom that Julian was guarding.

'It's not your business,' said the taller kid a bit angrily and Howard noticed the stress in his voice. 'Tell me Lord Creepy, _who_ is in there?' he demanded. 'I'm not telling you, Weinerman.'

'Oh yeah? Then I will pull the door off its hinges,' Howard warned and he marched towards the loo behind Julian and pushed him aside before jingling the doorknob several times.

'What the juice? It's jammed,' said Howard and he moaned, in which Julian silently grateful that the boy inside the bathroom had locked the door. The stout boy then banged on the dark blue wooden door, but gave up moments later. 'You…better tell me, Julian,' he seethed, 'Or else…'

'Or else what? You gonna tell everyone about me sleeping with Juggo every night? Go ahead! I don't care about it anymore!' exclaimed Julian, which surprised the ginger.

'What? No! I'm going to tell Slimovitz that you're not in the lobby with the others!' Howard argued. 'Well, so do you!' said the taller boy before embracing himself around Howard and started hitting him.

'Ready or not, I'm coming!' Ignoring Julian's attempts to stop him, Howard began to kick the bathroom's door, making Julian bit his lip nervously as he watched before he cried out bitterly, 'It's Cory!'

Hearing the teen with the purple top hat, Howard stopped. 'Excuse me?' he asked. Julian slid down from him and fiddled his hands and continued, wondering if Randy will punish him because of disobeying his order.

'C-Cory's traumatized with lions. He...he told me he once got mauled by one when he was at the lions' cage during his old school's trip to the zoo,' he told. He knew he had lied, but sometimes a lie is better than the truth, he thought.

"Come out Randy, and face your friend here!" he wished in silence.

(line break)

Meanwhile, on the other side of the blue door where Julian and Howard were, Randy Cunningham was unleashing his stank to the now possessed Lion-Bot which was causing destruction around Norrisville High School. He let out a maniacal laughter and shouted, 'Let the darkness reign!'

A deafening roar suddenly erupted the air and his grin went wider. Producing more of the black-red gas, he spoke, 'I've been sacrificing myself to you, Norrisville. After those times I'm with you, fighting for this town, what do I get? Nothing! Nothing but misery and humiliation!' His red eyes shone even brighter and the Lion-Bot's roar got louder. An explosion happened outside of the school, blowing bits of earth to his face through the hole he had made, but he didn't mind. He wanted them to experience fear and loss of hope, when the Norrisvillians knew their beloved Ninja was no longer coming for them.

_Feel the dark side of you, Randy Cunningham,_ a voice whispered to him. _Show to them that you're not a weakling! You're the most powerful Dark wizard, even better that the Sorcerer! Unleash your true power!_

(line break)

Howard and Julian were standing awkwardly outside the loo where Randy was, sometimes pretending to scratch their heads and twiddling their fingers. Suddenly a noise filled the silence and they went to the corridor that led to the windows, seeing the vast sea of Norrisville High's students were shouting something.

'What are they shouting about?' asked Howard and faced the goth. Julian only shrugged and they looked around, hoping to get someone to explain what happened. Howard reached his hand into the crowd and managed to drag a blond boy with spectacles and wearing a long-sleeved shirt and grey pants into the hallway where they were.

'For real cheese, Doug?!' was Howard's first response when he saw the school's infamous tattletale. Even Julian pulled a face to him.

Doug gasped when he saw them and spoke, 'You guys weren't in the lobby! I will tell Principal Slimovitz about this! Princi-' he started but Julian quickly covered the boy's head using his hat, making his voice sounded muffled, startling Howard.

'You better tell us Doug, or we will chuck you out of the school,' the dark-haired threatened. Howard could hear the trapped kid gulped in fear as he heard it. 'Fine! I will tell you! Just take this smelly hat off my head!' said Doug.

'"Smelly hat"?' Julian repeated, clearly offended with his words and to Howard's shock, he held Doug's neck and began to strangle the blond. 'No!' he shouted and pulled the boy away.

'Don't you dare to...' said Julian fiercely as he struggled to get out of Howard's clutch, 'INSULT MY HAT!' Howard rolled his eyes in annoyance and watched Doug pulled out the purple hat with such difficulty from his head.

'Ah, now that's better,' said the black-eyed with a relieved sigh. 'What are you waiting for? Tell us before he goes mad again!' scolded the stout boy, referring to Julian.

'Principal Slimovitz told us to search the Ninja around the school; is that clear?' At the moment, the other students started calling for the devoted hero of Norrisville.

'Ninja! Where are you? We need you right now!' they called in slight anxiety. 'Honkin' clear! Now clear off, Doug!' said Howard angrily when he witnessed his schoolmates and the tattletale hurriedly left to join the rest; Julian's hat fell onto the blue tiles of the corridor.

The pale, skinny boy escaped from his grasp and scurried to his headgear and wore it immediately with his usual smile. When his cougar blue eyes fell onto Howard's hazel eyes, he sighed and mumbled, 'Where's the Ninja?'

Howard could only stare back at the dark-haired kid and slowly shook his head.

'I don't know.'

(line break)

Randy was fully influenced with the mysterious voice's words that he didn't hear the racket happened outside the bathroom. Only when the chorused voices of the kids of NHS chanting the word "Ninja" echoed all over the school did he wake from his reverie and looked at his surroundings. It took him a while to catch up with the faint noise and his heart sank with guilt immediately.

He was the Ninja. He was supposed to protect Norrisville from any harm. But now there he was, creating chaos of his own. He took a peek at the outside of the white-and-blue building from the hole. There were giant holes everywhere and he caught a glimpse of the Lion-Bot's spiky red tail before it disappeared.

He could just go home as fast as he could and retrieved his Ninja Mask but then he remembered his deal with the menacing wizard who was just below Norrisville High, the Sorcerer.

_Torn_, Randy thought. He was torn between his responsibility as the Norrisville Ninja and the deal to cause mayhem in the town.

Sighing in defeat, he gazed at his hands, which had the wisps of his stank swirling around them. Suddenly, an idea popped in his head. It did sound crazy, and it costs his life if he wasn't careful enough. But he will be fine. He knew how hard it was to concentrate on two different things, but he hoped he was good enough at it by now.

With one hand controlling the Lion-Bot, Randy formed a shape of a person he knew very well using the other one. He smiled when its red scarf swiped his face for a second before it vanished and he continued focusing on the killer robot, ready to fulfill his job.


	19. A Warrior's Battle

Norrisville High School's surroundings was a terrible sight. Trees were pulled out of the ground, deep, massive holes were everywhere and the white-and-blue building's walls had jiggery scratches. The school's clock tower was bent so dangerously that it could fall at any second. Inside it, its students and teachers continuously called for the protector of Norrisville, the Norrisville Ninja.

'Ninja!' their anxiety grew as the time passed. They walked all over Norrisville High School's insides, assuming the masked person was hiding somewhere in the building. Among them was the town's gazillionnaire, Hannibal McFist and his family.

'Viceroy, this is getting worse,' he whispered through his phone to his assistant, Willem Viceroy III, who was in his office at McFist Industries. 'The Ninja hasn't appeared yet, and these people are feeling down even more each second.'

'I'm trying to rebuild the Robo-Ninja, just tell them the Ninja will come in a moment,' said the spectacled man impatiently and wiped beads of sweat on his forehead. In front of him was an almost finished body of a robot that resembled the town's protector. He just needed to put some Ninja gears to the robot so that the citizens will be convinced enough to think it was the Ninja.

'You're rebuilding the Ninja-Bot?' asked McFist in an excited tone. Unfortunately, his loud voice had made everyone's heads to turn at him and he grinned sheepishly. 'No need to worry, Norrisvillians, it's just our new toy, the Ninja-Bot. It will come out soon. Just need a bit of adjustments.' He laughed nervously but they ignored it before returning to call for the black-and-red suited figure.

Hannibal let out a relieved sigh and his wife, Marci came, placing her hands onto his broad shoulders and he smiled. 'How's it going?' she asked, already knew what was her husband talked about, 'The robot Ninja?'

'Not bad,' he replied and held her left hand gently. 'Just need some time to finish.' 'I wonder where is the real one,' Marci voiced her concern. 'So do I, honey girl.'

'I will search for Bash, don't end the call yet.' With that, she went to join the others and McFist's eyes drooped. He knew the Ninja's absence had something to do with the wonky Evil McChine Viceroy created the day before.

As he passed the school's numerous windows, he gazed at the holes in Norrisville High's compound. The now black-and-red Lion-Bot fired some missiles that poked out of its metallic back and they shot into the air before falling onto the wrecked ground and exploded, blinding him with their white light.

He was wondering about its new controller when someone moaned, 'Is the Ninja still sulking about yesterday?' and the crowd began chattering. Feeling intrigued with it, he patted a blond, stocky man and asked, 'What happened yesterday? And...' He pointed to the man.

'Mr. McFist! Glad to see ya! Call me Bannister if you want,' the man boomed and laughed heartily. 'Right, Bannister. So, what happened to the Ninja yesterday?' McFist repeated.

'Ah, bad news, Mr. McFist. Got bummed. By some chickens. Everyone was a witness. Such a disgrace.' Mr. Bannister shook his head as he talked and the gazillionnaire's eyes widened when a kid's shout woke him up from his trance, 'It's the Ninja!'

Surprised, he went to the windows along with the crowd and there he was, unmistakably the Norrisville Ninja, who had just arrived into the scene; the usual cloud of red smoke was around him for a second before it vanished.

Being squeezed by the excited Norrisvillians, he hardly could reach his phone and as he did, he said to his assistant, 'Viceroy, the Ninja is here now.' He was still stunned with the warrior's sudden appearance while the people inside Norrisville High were in such joy at his sight.

(line break)

Viceroy was adjusting the screws of his Robo-Ninja with his phone was at his ear and he was drinking his coffee when he heard the news and he spit it out, extremely shocked. 'What? But I haven't sent the robot yet!' he said.

'Forget the bot, Viceroy. The real one is here,' was McFist's reply and he slumped on his chair in disbelief. 'Wh-what's he doing right now?' he stammered.

'Dunno. Just standing there, eyeing the Lion-Bot, apparently,' said McFist, still watching the masked person. The Ninja somewhat unmoved from his place; he wondered if he did it on purpose.

'Let's go to the roof, we can see the Ninja even better there!' someone suggested and the rest cheered before heading to the flight of stairs that led to Norrisville High's roof, leaving the town's philanthropist alone.

'Keep watching him. I want to know what happens. If possible, record it,' said Viceroy and he ended the call, surprising McFist. Sighing, he tapped the recording app on his phone and started recording the scene.

(line break)

Howard Weinerman and the gothic boy Julian stared at the continuous sea of people running in front of them, each said, 'The Ninja has come! We're saved!' One of them even stopped and hugged them before went on racing for the stairs.

'What're we waiting for? Let's go, J!' Howard exclaimed and took Julian's hand, startling the blue-haired and he held his hat firmly as the ginger dragged him into the crowd. He cast a glance towards the bathroom he was supposed to guard, and he was worried for a second when he remembered the kid inside the room had locked the door and everyone was overjoyed with the Ninja's arrival, so he decided to gather with the rest and giggled joyfully before he and Howard disappeared into the crowd.

(line break)

Almost everyone in Norrisville High School was now squeezed against each other, trying to get to the school's roof through the only door there. One of them was the school's principal, Principal Irving Slimovitz.

'Alright everyone! Since we are having a blockage in here-' he said with a chuckle using his megaphone, pointing to the other six people around him '-I now advise you to queue in a perfect, orderly line. Then everyone can see the Ninja.' Some murmurs entered the air and a few kids shifted from their places but most of them acted as if they didn't hear what he said.

'I said, get in line!' the old man shouted and the crowd hurriedly started queuing, all shouted to each other:

'Get in the line!'

'Stop pushing me!'

'_You_ stop pushing me!'

'Out of my way, shoob!'

Principal Slimovitz only ran his fingers over his half-bald head as he listen the racket.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the people set in rest, and he slowly get out from the pack along with the other six. 'That will do,' he said triumphantly, 'Now, one by one, go to the roof.' Heeding the spectacled man's words, everyone gradually stepped forwards, headed by the principal. Meanwhile, Howard was moaning and banged his head at the white wall at the end of the line while Julian only watched him worriedly.

'Oh, come on Howard,' the goth said as the queue began to lessen, 'The line's getting shorter; let's move.' 'You go; I want to see the Ninja by myself,' the orange-haired retorted and he left the stairs. The taller boy hesitated but he needed to keep watch on him, so he followed him. The second they left, it was their turn to climb up the steps.

They went back to the windows and Howard couldn't help but feeling suspicious to the only man in the corridor, Hannibal McFist. "What the juice is he doing here?" he thought when he noticed the blond man was recording what happened outside the school. He cast a few careful glances at McFist, who apparently ignored him before lifting his gaze to the black-and-red suited person. As he watched, the Ninja coughed and he wondered if he was sick, which explained his disappearance earlier that day.

But then he asked himself: _If he was sick, how did he know Norrisville High was attacked?_

(line break)

The well-known Norrisville Ninja was still eyeing his victim of the day, the sturdy, gigantic Lion-Bot in front of him, which was now crouching warily with its red eyes staring at him viciously. He let out some coughs and drew out his usual weapon, a medium-sized sword and he held it firmly using both hands.

The robot wagged its spiky red tail and it began to step aside, drools escaping from its jaws. The Ninja was surprised to see the ground was corroded as the drops of saliva hit it and he gulped uneasily at the sight.

A loud noise interrupted his thoughts and he looked at Norrisville High School's roof, which was filled with the school's teachers and students, all of them chanted, 'Ninja! Ninja! Ninja!' Inspired with the words, the red-scarfed took a deep breath before charging at the machine.

The Lion-Bot roared and went to the figure opposite it, firing some of its missiles which kept refilling towards him. The Ninja stopped and started doing backflips, slides and running in zig-zags to avoid the rain of missiles and trapped in a thick mass of smoke. He took a few more steps and jumped on one of them, raising his katana when the bot turned around and swatted him with its tail and he fell on the clump of bushes in the school's compound (in which the audience winced). Shaking his head, he then retrieved the weapon and went back into the battle.

The blue-eyed fighter bit the hilt of his sword and he formed a shape of a fist from the air with his hands and fired it right at the robot's face, sending some of its teeth fell out. Seeing them, the Lion-Bot bared its metallic mouth even wider and lifted its tail. To his (and everyone's) surprise, the spikes on it changed into drill-shaped hooks and they began attacking him randomly.

The Ninja produced more of the Air Fists, and although he managed to knock some of the hooks, the Lion-Bot remained undamaged. Realizing the drills were gaining on him, he bolted away but one of them pinned on his scarf and he was yanked backwards before hitting the drill with a thud.

The witnesses gasped when they watched the Lion-Bot deliberately marched towards their hero, who massaged the back of his head. The time he realized the bot was coming closer, he stood up and tugged his scarf from the hook but with no success.

The Ninja knew he had no choice. Taking his sword, the people on top of Norrisville High let out a loud, sympathetic gasp when he cut the end of his beloved scarf, knowing how much the warrior liked it.

Escaped, the masked warrior gave the Lion-Bot a glare and he sprinted towards it again when the bot opened its mouth as wide as it could and spewed out a jet of fire to him. His eyes widened in panic before he leaped and threw some light blue balls out of his suit. The balls exploded and a cloud of steam blocked his sight, and he shielded his eyes from the heat produced. The moment he lowered his hand, the fire was put out already.

The machine let out a frustrated roar and it curled itself into a ball. Suddenly, tons of sharp spikes poked out of its body and it rolled towards the Ninja like a giant hedgehog, forming holes as it moved.

The masked hero of Norrisville moved to his right as the bot rolled, crushing trees into splinters and when it uncurled itself, he knew he couldn't miss it.

The Ninja jumped, grabbing the only chance he had and chopped the Lion-Bot's head off its body and it fell into one of the holes in Norrisville High's compound. Its massive body slumped onto the ground with a deafening clank and a bright white light suddenly shone from it, forcing everyone to cover their eyes. When they lowered their hands, they saw a great mass of black-red smoke went out of the robot's body, which was now...

...a pile of a gigantic lion's bones.


	20. Fallen Relic

Even though the people in Norrisville High had watched the Ninja's battles with monsters or robots that attacked the school (which sometimes wrecked the whole building) constantly that they became their regular basis, they still couldn't stop feeling excited when the masked person made his appearance to save the day. Now, they were on the school's roof, gawping at the pile of a previously huge robot lion's skeleton while at the same time, their beloved hero was refilling the numerous deep holes made by the machine using his Earth Attack (he heaved the bot's skull out of one of the holes with his long red scarf before he started the work). Some of them took pictures of the bones in the school's compound in awe and among the crowd was a tall, orange-haired girl in a beige blouse and dark brown skirt who was now cramped at the edge of the roof.

Heidi Weinerman looked around her, sometimes standing on her tiptoes, scanning for a stout boy in blue in the sea of people with an anxious look. Her red camera hat on her head was visualizing the scene at the school's roof, and she bit her lips in agitation.

'Howard!' she called in increasing angst. 'Howard, where are you?!' Only the chattering voices of Norrisville High's students and teachers answered her.

The girl pulled out a few strands of her orange hair and shook them away before gazing downwards, watching the Norrisville Ninja casting out some black-red wisps of smoke and the ground shook as the holes were filled with damp earth. She couldn't help from feeling fascinated with the ancient magic the warrior made, yet again she was also confused.

The Ninja hadn't spoken since he first arrived to defeat the Lion-Bot. Not even a word.

Determined to find the reason, Heidi inhaled deeply and entered the crowd, making her way towards the door that led into the school and she was almost out of breath when she grasped the doorknob of the blue door and swung the door open before going downstairs.

What she didn't notice was that a pair of black eyes was tailing her, eyeing her suspiciously.

'Alright everyone,' spoke Norrisville High School's principal, Irving Slimovitz through his megaphone and all the people in the scene fell silent, 'let's go and greet our Ninja!' The moment he said the last word, they rushed to the only door- 'Watch out, 'cuz the school's wobbling now!' he warned- and once again, some of them were wedged against each other at the entrance. The half-bald man groaned and shook his head as he heard the usual bellows from them.

(line break)

Hazel-eyed Howard Weinerman was keeping his eyes on the figure of the Ninja from inside the school along with the gothic boy Julian when a swiftly-made sound caught his ears and he spun around warily, only to see no one was in the corridor, except Norrisville's gazillionnaire, Hannibal McFist, who was still recording what happened outside with his McPhone. He clicked his tongue and Julian looked up, noticing his worried look. 'What's wrong, Howard?' he asked.

'Nothing. Guess it's just the wind,' the ginger replied curtly. 'Hey, wanna go and see Ninja?' 'Well...' the blue-haired kid scratched the back of his head and faced away from Howard. He was still wondering what did the silver-haired, red-eyed Randy Cunningham do in the bathroom in which he had already forgotten where it was (though he did remember it was somewhere near the school's science lab) and his mind wandered to a point where he saw himself being hanged upside down and was tormented with fierce dogs around a giant cauldron of lava by the snowy-haired for leaving his job.

He was certainly not into such torture although he was fond of them.

'...of course,' said Julian, letting out a nervous cackle. Howard put on a flat expression in his face and he went quiet again, gulping in fright.

'Hurry up, then,' the ginger grunted and trod down the stairs behind him. The goth sighed in relief and headed towards the flight of stairs, his eyes fell onto the blond man who had apparently heard the conversation. He cast a few doubtful glances at him before joining Howard, who was grumping at the landing and they jogged to the school's blue grand doors to meet the Ninja.

After three minutes they left, Hannibal McFist switched off his phone and raced for the stairs as well.

(line break)

Heidi was now at Norrisville High's compound, where the holes made by the wonky Lion-Bot were completely refilled and she carefully walked across the grassy compound while her cerulean blue eyes darted back and forth for any sight of the Norrisville Ninja. The second she caught a glimpse of him, her eyes drooped.

The masked hero of the town was kneeling on the ground, clenching the shredded cloth of his long red scarf around his neck and she remembered the moment when he was forced to cut it in order to destroy the mutated robot.

The damp soil below Heidi's red shoes crunched as she headed towards the Ninja. As she walked, she began to doubt whether what she did was right, but she was Heidi Weinerman, the "MeCast" girl and everyone in Norrisville watched her show, so she decided to get at least a few words from the black-clad guy.

'Er...Ninja?' she started and took a step forwards in which she regretted it immediately.

The spot she placed her foot was at one of the giant holes the Ninja had filled, and now it was sinking into the ground. Surprised and losing of balance, Heidi stumbled forwards and she shut her eyes, waiting for the impact of the wet earth on her visage.

Suddenly, she felt her body was lifted up and when she opened her eyes, the Ninja was there, holding her arm emotionlessly. She wasn't sure if he was in a bad mood or putting on a flat expression to fight the urge to laugh at her.

'Um, I...I'm sorry about your scarf, Ninja,' Heidi started, now was red in the face and looked down to the tattered piece of red cloth in the town's warrior's hand. The blue-eyed followed her gaze and let go of the girl's hand, not uttering a word. Their eyes met for a while before the Weinerman girl muttered a 'Thank you' as she stood up and swept the dirt on her knee with her hand.

The Ninja didn't reply her. Instead, his sapphire blue eyes fell on the red camera hat she wore on her head, which was still in record mode. His eyes narrowed in suspicion upon the sight of the device and out of sudden, looking alarmed. He lifted his gaze to Heidi, who was cursing under her breath and sneakily pulled out a small black-and-red ball from his Ninja suit and the red-haired girl looked up, noticing his nervous movements.

They made a short eye contact before the warrior of Norrisville threw the smoke bomb in front of her, catching her in surprise- 'Ninja!' she shouted -and the tiny orb blinded her as it exploded, spewing out thick red smokes. Heidi coughed while waving her hands to the clouds with tears filled the corner of her eyes.

The time the smoke from the Ninja's smoke bomb was gone, she squint around her, only to find everyone in Norrisville High (who had somehow managed to get out of the school's roof) was circling her, having a quite sour look in their faces.

'I-I didn't manage to talk to h-h-him,' Heidi stuttered, wincing in utter embarrassment. 'H-he seemed to be in a hurry.' The crowd moaned and they turned away from her to see the wreckage the maniac Lion-Bot had caused. The gossip girl of the school only lowered her head and took her camera hat and turned it off, her head was full of the Ninja's strange behaviour.

The crowd gave a sympathetic glance to Norrisville High School, which was abso-honking-lutely bashed to its foundations. The great blue-and-white well-known structure in the town had severe jagged lines all over the walls, and its clock tower was bent downwards so dangerously that it could fall at anytime, and when they stared at the building for about ten seconds, a deafening crack entered the air and everyone in the school's compound ran for their lives as the tower snapped into two and collapsed on the grassy clearing, followed by some of the debris around the wrecked high school, sending dust everywhere and people coughing here and there.

Someone cleared his throat in the thick mist of dust and after the dust was gone, the sea of people with watery eyes spun to Norrisville's beloved philanthropist, Hannibal McFist along with his family.

'Norrisville High has suffered such catastrophe from the wonkingly dangerous Lion-Bot,' he began. His wife, Marci was resting her head on his broad shoulder, brushing away specks of dust on her husband's brown suit while her son, Bash whistled honkin' badly but they just ignored it (no one _dared_ to mess up with him). 'As for that, I, Hannibal McFist, your brucest Samaritan, I will hire the best builders to rebuild Norrisville High, and for real cheese, I'm inviting everyone to my special party tonight!'

The crowd gave each other a confused look before cheered joyfully when they heard the unexpected announcement and the blond man grinned, staring at the screen of his purple McPhone.

A dark-skinned man with square-framed glasses smiled smugly at him and he switched off the device, shouting excitedly, 'Tonight at nine! Don't forget to come and put on your best rags for the party!'

Alongside the crowd was a brown-haired man who was wearing a cowboy hat on his head, a white shirt and torn blue pants, exposing his knobbly knees and had his arms folded. His light blue eyes scanned through the sea of people but he couldn't find the usual figure of a tall raven-haired boy among them although he did see the boy's friend in the crowd. A suspicious frown appeared in his face when he realized his absence and he crept away from the scene without anyone noticed.


	21. Wizard Talk

Inside one of the bathrooms in the ruined Norrisville High School, a pale-skinned, silvery-haired boy was sprawling on the loo's cold red-tiled floor, his body was shaking feverishly and he was wheezing heavily for breath. He had collapsed a few minutes ago and could feel his energy had drained too much. His heart thumped heavily inside his body and he was too weak to do anything, he could not even lift a finger.

Within seconds, a wisp of black-red foul-smelling gas entered the room from an eye-sized hole bore on the wall at his right and circled him. Along with it was another cloud of the same colour which then produced a translucent form of a black-and-red dressed masked figure. The spectre gaze at the helpless teenager at his feet while the mysterious stank swirled to the boy's opened mouth, illuminating his visage with its red glow before going inside him through his mouth and nose. The kid knew nothing since his eyes were closed, and as the black-red stank reached his heart, it shone in a faint white gleam for a second before the light disappeared. The ghost shut its sapphire blue eyes and it changed into the same wisp of smoke like the former and disappeared into the white-haired as well.

The teen remained lying on the floor until he figured he was strong enough and very carefully, he crawled shakily towards the nearest of the bathroom's walls and leant against it, still panting. His chest was now rising and falling gently, and his eyelids fluttered open before gazing absent-mindedly at the dark blue door opposite him. His pair of ruby red eyes twinkled dimly when he stared around him.

Suddenly, the whole room seemed to be foreign to him. He knew he was in a bathroom, but in what building? He looked around alarmingly in hopes of getting some clues of his whereabouts. The sinks and stalls didn't help much; every lavatory has them. He was about to get up when he heard a whoosh inside the bathroom and glanced aside. To his surprise, a greenish glowing head of an extremely wrinkled man was in the room's drain hole, its white eyes peered at him with great interest. A wicked grin which showed off the man's sickly yellow teeth was plastered in his luminous visage and the boy let out a horrified scream when he realized the man had no body and backed away from the head as far as he could muster from his dangerously low energy. His red eyes widened in terror as the bodiless man squeezed through the bars of the drain hole and snaked his way towards him and he grabbed the hood of his black-and-red jacket in fright and covered his whole head with it, shivering badly.

'There's nothing to be afraid of,' the floating head spoke in a deep, hoarse voice, and there was something in his voice that made the white-haired stopped cowering. Slowly but surely, he lifted his hood a bit and cast a glimpse at the man. He was hooded and green wisps of gas were all over him. His blank eyes continued to eye him in a way that he began to feel uncomfortable with it.

'W-who are you?' his voice quivered as he asked the spectre in front of him and lowered his hand from his hood. 'Don't you remember me?' the head asked back. The teen blinked cluelessly at the head before shaking his head as his answer.

The pale boy saw could hear the head rolled its eyes in annoyance and muttered under his breath and seconds later, his ancient voice boomed out, 'I am the evil Sorcerer who lived under this pathetic place for _**eight**__ hundred_ years. We have made a _deal_, remember?'

Now that the Sorcerer had mentioned it, the kid's mind automatically replayed the scene in his dream last night. He _did_ do an awful deal with the wrinkled man in the dream, and he nodded.

'Very well,' said the Sorcerer with a smile. 'I thought you cannot recall it anymore, sonny. We didn't do much last night, did we? Now tell me, what's your name, boy?'

The teen was wondering whether the dream he had was real or not as he gazed at the Sorcerer's stank-made head for a long time and the question snapped him out of his thoughts the second he heard it. _Should I tell the truth?_ he thought doubtfully. He knew it will cost him his life, but his life had already gone, taken by the disgraces he faced the day before.

'R-Randy. Randy Cunningham,' he mumbled out. The Sorcerer's projection only stared at him with a frown. 'But I'm using the name "Cory Russell" as a cover so that no one will know me,' he continued hastily. 'To seek your revenge, right?' added the old wizard's image and he jumped, not expecting the words from him and nodded once again, the scenes of his humiliations were flashing before his eyes. His hands were clenched so tight that some veins in his hands could be seen and his red eyes shone brightly in anger beneath his hood. 'Yes,' said Randy through gritted teeth.

'To be honest, Randy, I have been watching you since you manipulated the machine into such a terrible beast' –the Sorcerer went on and Randy looked up, forgetting his wrath as he watched the head moved in mid-air in awe- 'and I must say, young man...I am much impressed with your effort just now.'

'Thank you,' said Randy a bit gratefully, a weak smile appeared in his face. 'I was, until that wretched Ninja butt in and ruined the chaos that happened!' yelled the spectre and Randy cringed as it lunged towards him. The image, however stopped about an inch from his nose and the kid gulped silently with cold beads of sweat trickled down from his forehead when he blinked several times, staring deep into the Sorcerer's eyes for a while before the head rose into the air, his hoarse voice echoed inside the bathroom, 'It doesn't matter, anyway. You have done a great job and I'm expecting you to do well next time. Even better, destroy the Ninja _first_ before you wreck the whole world with me, Randy Cunningham. Until then, have a rest. You deserve it, my boy.' With that, the head flew towards the bathroom's drain hole and broke into the green clouds of gas before entering it, leaving Randy in puzzlement when he watched the green light from the Sorcerer's stank gradually disappear from his sight as it headed back to the real Sorcerer who was below Norrisville High School.

Randy leant against the wall behind him and gave out a relieved sigh, feeling glad that his arch-enemy still hadn't worked out the connection between Randy Cunningham and the Norrisville Ninja. He just needed to make sure the Sorcerer knew nothing of him or else, he will be the first victim of the shoob-tastic wizard. But he doubted the Sorcerer will kill him once he found out his secret identity since he was his ally now.

He subconsciously massaged the back of his head which was throbbing a bit, his mind was filled with the time he woke up after being drained of energy and could not remember anything at all. _Am I having stank-nesia?_ he wondered and lowered his hand. He then shook his head to ease the pain, decided to think no more of the short memory loss he had.

Figuring out he was well enough to move around, Randy held the brim of the sink beside him and got up with shaky legs before walking towards the sink where he had put his blue satchel. Then, he swung the bag onto his shoulder as he turned the bathroom's silver doorknob and stepped out of the room to see the world.

(line break)

Under Norrisville High School, the Sorcerer watched as his green stank swirled towards him and he took one of his Chaos Pearls from the belt of mystical green orbs around his waist and held it up. The stank circled the orb before penetrating it, causing the ball to glow and the image of a boy with spiky purple hair and sapphire blue eyes appeared on its surface, slightly beaming at the old wizard.

'Randy Cunningham,' spoke the Sorcerer, caressing the orb which was now floating opposite him. 'I can see a true potential of being an evil wizard like me inside you. You might going to suffer for a few days, but it won't last long, my boy, for you are the ninth of the ninth.

'I cannot wait for your next scheme, Randy.'


	22. Finding Cory

**Since the premiere of the film "Finding Dory" is quite close, I think this chapter will do as a thing. As always, do enjoy this fic &amp; review!**

* * *

Randy glanced through the corridor as he went out of the bathroom and gently closed the wooden blue door behind him. The hallway was quite dark, and once again, he could not remember where he was. He massaged the back of his head again and shut his eyes, trying to contact the only kid his mind could summon up.

Nine seconds later, his eyes turned fully red and he spoke, 'I need you, Julian.'

(line break)

'Alright, students! Since the school has totally fallen to pieces, and it will be fully collapsed in thirty minutes, I suggest you to take all your books and bring them home. That way, you won't have to keep paying for them when destruction happens!' announced Principal Irving Slimovitz using his red megaphone to the students of Norrisville High, who groaned upon hearing it.

The school's principal watched with a smile in his face and his hands were on his hips as the teens went back into the severely damaged well-known structure in Norrisville. One by one, they slowly slithered themselves through the visible cracks which led into the building. Among them were two boys, one was tall and quite skinny while the other was short and stout and they scanned around to find a suitable place for both to get in. However, every place that could be used was rather small and the short one began to grumble.

'How am I supposed to enter when there seems no entrance at all?' moaned the pudgy Howard Weinerman and he pouted. 'You know, maybe I could get in and take your stuffs as well, Howard,' said the tall one, a kid named Julian who dressed all purple like a goth. He went silent straight away when Howard gave him a sharp look.

'You? Take my stuffs? No thanks! I'd rather squeeze myself in than you get hold on my stuffs!' Howard said vehemently and before Julian could make a move, the orange-haired marched towards the (possibly) largest opening appeared on the school's wall, which size could barely fit him and was beside the previously main doors of Norrsiville High. He took a long breath and pushed himself in, trying to pass through the crack, but only his upper body could get through it.

'Shoob it, Weinerman! You just got yourself stuck in a hole!' he mumbled out and continued to pull himself despite the fact that he was totally jammed in it. After two minutes, he was sweating and panting like a dog. 'I give up!' he cried out.

Suddenly, someone pushed the lower part of his body, which startled him but he was too tired to do anything, so he just let whoever outside there to push him and after several fruitless efforts, the person gave a mighty lurch and Howard popped out of the hole. Finally free, he shook his head, expecting some kid, like his ex-biffer, Randy Cunningham came to help. Instead, the person was the dreaded Julian.

'You touch my butt!' Howard roared. 'At least thank me for getting you out of this,' said Julian with a sour look and he crawled in. The Weinerman boy backed away as the tall teen entered and stood up, brushing away specks of dirt and dust on his clothes. 'Well, what are you waiting for? Let's get our stuffs,' Julian reminded him and walked away. Slowly but surely, Howard followed him.

As they walked, Howard suddenly heard a buzz from his outer shirt and pulled out his McFist Pad and turned it on. Seeing a notification was on its screen, he swiped the screen and tapped the notice to see what it was.

'Did you hear that, razzle-dizzles? Norrisville's beloved man, Hannibal McFist's gonna held a bruce party tonight at his HQs! Nine o' clock! Be sure to be the first to be greeted by the gazillionnaire of Norrisville himself!' quoted Heidi Weinerman in her new "MeCast" report, in which he found it to be "mega wonk-city (it was his sister's show that displeases him whenever he heard it)" and he switched off his McFist Pad and shoved it into his light blue shirt as he moved along one of the corridors in the ruined Norrisville High School, which was packed with kids taking out their school stuffs from their lockers to be brought home.

'I can't believe it! There's a party tonight, and we're off from school tomorrow!' exclaimed Julian, who was now beside Howard and the ginger only gave him a flat expression as the raven-haired twirled around him in delight. 'Isn't it great, Howard? We are going to have the best party ever!'

'Yeah, it is. Except you've ruined the fun of it,' said Howard in a monotonous tone and walked away from the kid with the top hat. 'What?' Julian flabbergasted and scurried after the stout boy. 'Why?' he asked when he caught up with him. 'Is there something bad happened, Howard?'

'Don't you feel something fishy has happened?' Howard said and stopped, followed by the pale-skinned kid. '"Fishy"?' repeated Julian and then let out a giggle (in which Howard rolled his eyes at the moment). 'How fishy is that _something_? And what is that _something_?'

'Cunningham,' the hazel-eyed muttered, lowering his head. Julian stopped laughing and started fiddling his fingers instead. 'As for Randall...I don't think I've seen him throughout the day,' he pointed out a bit nervously.

'Exactly! _That_ is the fishy thing! He's not in school!' shouted the kid dressed in blue, causing the taller boy took a step backwards. 'Are you sure? I mean, he could just possibly hiding somewhere in here...' said Julian with another fit of a giggle and faced away from the ginger. He couldn't tell Howard about his biffer's whereabouts or else the hooded boy's identity as a wizard will be exposed and he will get tormented by him for revealing his secret.

Still, being stuck with Howard Weinerman was a wonkin' job to do. He knew, the kid will never stop searching for Randy Cunningham until the end of the day and he had dragged himself into such crisis. _If only I had stayed a bit farther from the bathroom_, he thought miserably. He glanced at Howard, who had taken out his McFist Pad again and was now playing the game "Grave Puncher: Grave Crush".

Yet...

'Cory! I forgot about him!' exclaimed Julian out of the blue with both hands at his head. Howard chuckled and then stopped. 'Cory?' he asked, frowning. 'Cory who?' 'Cory Russell, the new kid in school! I have to find him!' the gothic replied frantically and dashed to the nearest bathroom and swung its wooden blue door open. 'Cory?' he called and scanned the whole room before slamming the door shut and ran back into the hallway where Howard was and sped along it. Howard looked up and with a snort, he began to pursue after him.

Howard only watched as Julian went into each bathroom they passed by, shrieking his head off for that Russell kid. 'Oh, come on Julian!' he groaned after the blue-haired searched the 9th lavatory. 'He's a newbie; let him be in the toilet whenever he wants! I mean, he's not even your cousin, in which I bet you didn't have any! Why would you tire yourself looking for him?'

'You won't understand, Howard,' Julian hissed and went on calling for the pale boy in black-and-red. Howard's ears started to burn with the word 'Cory' and he was about to yell when out of sudden, Julian fell silent. Feeling strange with it, he headed towards the goth, who stood still a few feet ahead him. He stopped beside him and stared at the boy's face. He seemed to be in a trance and his previously cougar blue eyes had turned fully red and were gazing ahead. Howard waved his hands before his eyes but Julian took no notice. Instead, he began to shuffle forwards, a slow sigh escaped his slightly opened mouth.

The orange-haired once again was at Julian's tail and recorded his zombie-like attitude with his McFist Pad as they entered corridor after corridor. He was stroking his chin when he saw a black marker was on the floor and he picked it up. Giggling, he took the cap off and stepped in front of Julian and drew a thick moustache above his lips. He then kept the marker inside one of his McShorties' pockets.

Finally, they reached the stairs that led to the school's science lab and Howard realized that Julian suddenly shook his head feverishly. He kept his Pad into his shirt and braced himself for any possibilities of getting attacked.

'Howard?' spoke Julian and faced him, which, to his surprise, he had returned to normal. 'How can we be here?' '_You_ led us here,' the hazel-eyed pointed out.

'I do? But I can't remember that...' he trailed off. He looked up and his eyes went wide. 'Cory!' he called and climbed up the stairs in such hurry. Howard meanwhile, put on his sour look first before going upstairs.

When he reached the second floor, Julian was in front of the bathroom they were earlier and there was a hooded kid opposite him, smiling at the dark-haired.

'I-I'm seeking your apology, Cory, for being late,' he heard Julian mumble to the mysterious person. He however, did not reply him and glanced at Howard and his smile grew wider, as if he had waited for the perfect moment to do it.

For Howard was spooked out of his cheese at the sudden action.

'Dude, you're wonking my cheese!' said Howard a bit angrily and the kid laughed heartily when he heard it. 'Really, that was a very old joke, scaring people by looking at them without them knowing,' he spoke; his voice was quite icy. 'Riiiight.'

The boy walked towards him with Julian was behind him and Howard could see part of his hidden visage from his hood. He had red irises at his eyes and his hair was snow-white. His pale skin glared from his dark clothing. A blue satchel was hanging on his right shoulder and Howard began to feel odd with it since _Randy Cunningham_ also had the same bag.

'Cory -'the kid began, in which Howard cut in, 'Yeah, you're Cory Russell, new shoob of Norrisville High, I welcome you to our wrecked school.' Cory only blinked his eyes several times and he snickered.

'You got it right,' he said. 'Riiiight,' replied Howard and there was a short silence before they broke into laughter.

'I hate to interrupt you two' – spoke Julian, putting his arms on each of the boys' shoulders and both Cory and Howard went quiet - 'but...thirty minutes given is almost end.' 'Riiiight,' both boys said in unison and they hooted happily. Julian knitted his eyebrows upon the sight and Cory voiced, 'Nah, we're just joking, Julian. Let's go before we're buried under this school.'

'Seriously? Your joke is even worse than Ranginald Bagel's!' exclaimed Howard as they made their way down to the ground floor. 'Who is he?' Cory asked. 'It's best for you to not know him.' 'Oh.'


End file.
